Art Smitten: Reviews - 2016

There always seems to be something unsatisfying about these personal depictions of major historical events. Human dramas with a historical "backdrop" work well enough, but if the huge scale history is in the foreground it can really upset the balance. Jackie, the first English Language film from Chilean director Pablo Larraín, shows the immediate aftermath of John F. Kennedy's assassination from the point of view of his wife, Jacqueline Lee Kennedy. Mostly it's a psychological portrait of a grieving, widowed mother of two small children who has some very difficult decisions to make. There are countless movie protagonists who've been put in this same predicament, but of course she also just so happens to be the First Lady of the United States, and her husband just so happened to be the President. Because of their positions, any gossip about their private lives is thought of as political fodder and is of great interest to the public. Noah Oppenheim's screenplay works across three separate but very close points in time: the few days after his death, flashbacks from the last few weeks of his life and a press interview conducted in Jackie's new home, after she has left the White House. The journalist (Billy Crudup) says that after seeing how poised she was during her television tour of the White House, he thought she could have a career on the small screen. She's quite offended by this idea, but she does know how the media works. She knows she is going to be asked for a piece by piece, moment by moment account of how it all happened and how she has been coping. She also knows that if she gives them nothing, they'll just interpret her silence however they want (most likely cruelly), so she makes sure to tell him what he can and can't print from the whole exchange. She doesn't want him to publish anything misleading, even if it’s what she actually said. She has no qualms about being slightly dishonest with the world in order to show them her truest self. In many ways, Larraín and Oppenheim are being driven by the same curiosity as the journalist. This film is an intensely personal account of everything she felt, thought and dealt with over that terrible week, with occasional glimpses at what the rest of the world was going through too. Such a narrow focus in a historical film is always a double-edged sword. On the one hand, if you only have 100 minutes it's best not to bite off more than you can chew, but it can also feel like a frustrating waste of all that meaty material from what’s happening around her. In Jackie, people sometimes talk about Lee Harvey Oswald, Charles de Gaulle, Vietnam and the like, but most of what you see and remember are close ups of the First Lady as she is steadily imploding. The character of Jackie, as the title would suggest, basically is the film. Playing her would have been a tall order for any actor that Larraín might have cast. If she'd been someone with a weak screen presence, this would’ve been a trainwreck. Luckily for him, he cast Natalie Portman. 6 years after Black Swan, Portman looks set to take home another Best Actress Oscar for playing a hard-working woman who is slowly falling apart before the audience's eyes (although, unlike Nina, Jackie does manage to put herself back together again). Once again, she fully embodies every bit of pain, pressure, confusion and terror her character is feeling. For much of the film, cinematographer Stéphane Fontaine looks like he's capturing a live theatre performance, and is content to let her powerhouse acting carry the film. Meanwhile, Mica Levi’s musical score is overly theatrical, and seems determined to be the star of the film instead of her. There's no doubt that as a Natalie Portman showcase, Jackie effortlessly succeeds, but her character does feel at odds with the rest of the film's world. The most intimate scenes with the First Lady have quite a polished and digital feel to them, while all the major "events" in the film (the assassination, the funeral, Oswald's arrest) have more of a grainy period quality, which lends them a lot of credibility. While with Mrs Kennedy you certainly feel like you're watching a high-profile actress take on the part, whenever the brilliantly cast Caspar Phillipson is onscreen, you just feel like you're looking at the real JFK: that’s how much of a likeness he is. It might have been more effective to film the whole movie in that celluloid style, but as it is, Jackie is a very engaging 21st Century look at one of the most earth-shattering tragedies of the 1960s. I suppose a fair bit of Jacqueline Kennedy's personal journey is emblematic of the global aftermath of her husband's death, and how people wanted him to be remembered. Interestingly, a later exchange with her local priest (John Hurt) is pretty much reflective of Jackie’s gradual success as a film, and not just as a Natalie Portman fan piece. Initially, both the priest and the film are saying what they need to say to justify their presence here – nothing more, nothing less – but eventually they both admit to their own limitations and give honest answers about where they think we should go all from here.   Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

After the melancholy vampire story that was Only Lovers Left Alive, Jim Jarmusch has delivered an equally meditative human drama with Paterson. It’s a film that shows a week in the life of a lovely artistic couple living in Paterson, New Jersey. Laura (Golshifteh Farahani) is an avid painter, designer and cupcake maker, with a distinctive monochromatic colour scheme in everything she makes, and wears, though ironically she is a very colourful character. Her husband, Paterson (Adam Driver), is a gentle poet who drives a bus for a living, and uses all of his break time to write a few lines in his "secret notebook". While Laura sells her wares at the local farmers’ market, where they're very popular, Paterson won't share his work with anyone other than her. For ages, she's been telling them he should get his poems published, or at the very least make copies of them. Eventually he promises to photocopy them all on the weekend, on one of those last two days that the film shows. This is hardly a movie that runs on suspense, mostly it's an episodic musing on the little things in life, but there are still a few little narrative arcs that are given a nice payoff. One of these is the question of whether he'll keep that promise in time. Unlike Laura, who shares a piece of her creativity everywhere she goes, Paterson is just happy to watch the world go by. Laura is the one with all the latest gadgets, while Paterson doesn't even have a mobile phone. He's content to just let it all come and go, just like his poems, and his passengers of course. As you’d expect, he hears all sorts of things when he’s eavesdropping at the wheel. People have some very amusing conversations when it looks like no one is listening. There’s plenty of shots of him smirking at them while looking at the road, but these snippets never really make their way into his poems. That would have been too predictable, and far too neat. He mostly writes about what he sees at home, or at the park where he eats his lunch every day. Adam Driver’s voiceover readings of these poems are pleasingly unpolished. Paterson doesn’t sound like he’s reciting them for an audience, he really does sound like he’s writing the words as they come to him. Jarmusch only overstretches believability when it comes to the couple’s dog, Marvin. He’s certainly adorable, but Jarmusch can’t seem to decide if he wants him to be an anthropomorphised animal character, like Gromit, or a projection of whatever the human characters are going through. It might have been more effective to just let him be a dog, another part of Paterson’s world that he can silently take in. Paterson is very much a quiet observer who’s surrounded by some very vocal characters. His boss, Donny (Rizwan Manji) is one of those people who likes to answer with complete honesty when someone asks him how he is. Paterson’s favourite bar is also frequented by an actor named Everett (William Jackson Harper) and his ex-girlfriend, Marie, (Chasten Harmon) who Everett can’t seem to let go of and to whom he won’t stop making melodramatic professions of his undying love. While these figures encourage Paterson to come out of his shell a little and make his mark on the world, they’re never called upon to transform him. Jarmusch isn’t interested in showing how an introvert can turn into an extrovert. Instead, he shows how it’s possible for someone so quiet to navigate a world where it’s survival of the loudest and still remain true to themself.   Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

The Founder is screenwriter Robert D. Siegel’s scathing portrait of Roy Kroc, the eponymous creator of the McDonald’s Corporation, not to be confused with the McDonald brothers who created, well, McDonald’s. If that sounds as all suss it’s probably because it was. Kroc, as written by Siegel, and played by Michael Keaton, is a shameless anti-hero, an opportunistic businessman who listens more to his motivational tapes than he does to his own conscience, if indeed he has one. The film follows his great ascent (or descent, depending on how you look at it) from a not-so-humble milkshake-mixer merchant to the owner of a giant plagiarised franchise. He’s that kind of smarmy fourth-wall-breaking capitalist who is usually the smartest person in the room. However, Siegel, and director John Lee Hancock, both suggest he might simply be the most “persistent” person working in the food industry, since one of his favourite tapes tells him that neither genius nor talent can ever be a substitute for persistence. In his mind, persisting seems to mean sacrificing your integrity and your personal relationships for money. This is exactly why Dick and Mac McDonald (Nick Offerman and John Carroll Lynch), an honest pair of farmers, chose to abandon their first ill-fated attempt at franchising the business. When Kroc first suggests that they give it another go, they tell him they’d rather run one quality restaurant than fifty mediocre ones, especially since that first one in San Bernardino took them decades to build. While the brothers see their popular “Speedee Service System” as a wholesome masterwork of efficiency, Kroc sees it as a cash cow to be fattened, reproduced and milked for all its worth. Still, Mac thinks that Kroc can do a much better job of the expansion than they did, and Dick thinks that with the right contract he can safely keep Kroc on a leash. Even for those who don’t already know the story, there’s never any doubt how horribly this will end for the brothers. After all, Dick and Mac will always be looking out for each other and their legacy on top of the financial state of the business, while Kroc ticks all the boxes for a character who’s only looking out for himself and his bank account. The most obvious of these, for an ambitious middle-aged man, is the routine long-suffering wife, played here by Laura Dern. A memorable quote from her character in Wild (2014) pretty well sums up much of her recent career: “I've always been someone's daughter or mother or wife. I never got to be in the driver's seat of my own life.” Especially in films like 99 Homes (from the same year) Dern has often played women who’ve had the men in their life make choices for them. Despite her being an incredibly supportive partner, The Founder shows Roy going behind her back to cancel their club memberships, disown their friendship group, mortgage their house, and ensure that she gets no part of McDonald’s Incorporated when he finally divorces her. Her submissiveness throughout most of this makes her one of the least interesting of these characters that Dern has played in recent years, but she makes it work well enough. Still, she’s definitely not as engaging as Kroc’s second wife, Joan (Linda Cardellini), who Kroc courts when she’s still married to one of his new buyers. Once he’s stolen her away, and bought off the McDonald brothers as cheaply as he could, he quite literally has everything he’s ever wanted. By this point, every single character goal that Siegel sets up for him has been achieved (Given that this a true story, I don’t think this counts as a spoiler). For some reason, the last shot is of his big new bedroom mirror, which he looks into tearfully before going outside with Joan. I never took this character to be the crying type, but I hope they were tears of some twisted joy. If that was meant to be some sudden moment of feeling empty, remorseful or self-reflective, it was far too late to bring that in. The Founder might be a true story, but it’s hardly a human story. It’s actually quite cerebral and subversive in the way it questions the myth of the American dream. It’s essentially a cautionary tale against large scale enterprise, especially when Kroc starts comparing those big yellow McDonald’s arches to the Christian cross, and by extension suggesting that capitalism is America’s new religion, with franchise outlets as the new churches. This link is drawn even more strongly given that last year Keaton starred in Spotlight, the rather forgettable Best Picture winner about the corruption inside the Catholic Church. In its own way, The Founder is an even more chilling and timely reminder of what you can get away with once you have enough money and real estate to bury your crimes under.   Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

Threadbare   Featuring: Fipe Preuss, Elnaz Sheshgelani and Phillipa Russell Choreographer: Kathleen Gonzales Producer: Natasha Jynel Threadbare is a three-part multidisciplinary show that celebrates the diversity of Australian identity through dance, poetry and visual art. The show is presented in languages including English, Spanish, Tongan, Arabic and Auslan. Threadbare invites audiences to shift their perspectives and open their eyes with ideas that challenge convention in modern Australian society. It brings together artists from diverse backgrounds to explore the commonalities of human experience.   Each artist brings a personal reflection and identity to the show. In Threadbare, there is poetry featuring Dr Quinn Eades exploring feminist, queer and trans series of the body. His poem The Urge to Speak encourages gender queer people to find a voice. What does it mean to be in contemporary Australia? How do our languages, culture, heritage and traditions connect us? As a society, the most difficult thing is to look at ourselves and to ask ourselves what work is still needed to foster healing an inclusion. Threadbare explores the conflict between the “otherness” and belonging in contemporary Australia. The show also features Phillipa Russell, the only deaf actress in the show. Phillipa’s solo is performed entirely in Auslan and alludes to the theme of arriving into an unknown country. She performs of a curious bystander who arrives in a land inhabited by Indigenous peoples – a young white woman who arrives on the scene completely not knowing what’s going on. The show begins with the steady sound of a heartbeat, which leaves the audience wondering what will happen next. The atmosphere felt strangely chaotic, as the entire room is engulfed in darkness, and two women slowly appear dressed in white robes with their faces concealed, chanting an interpretation of Welcome to Country.   Written by Caroline Tung

Arrival is the latest film by Canadian director Denis Villeneuve, written by Eric Heisserer and adapted from a short story by Ted Chiang. It’s a science-fiction film in which aliens arrive on Earth and Dr Louise Banks, a linguist, played by Amy Adams, is asked to help decipher their language in order to find out their purpose on Earth. Over the course of the film we join Dr Banks in solving this curious puzzle, as she races against the worldwide chaos caused by the presence of these creatures. Interspersed with the plot of Dr Banks and the aliens is another storyline involving her daughter, which not only adds emotional weight but also ends up being quite a central element in understanding the film itself. There’s an absolutely brilliant confluence of visual, emotional and intellectual elements that keep you engrossed and awed throughout the film’s duration. Everything just comes together so well. First, let’s talk about the visuals. In particular, all the things to do with the aliens are immaculately designed. The aliens are these kinds of seven-limbed knuckle squids which in the film they call “heptapods”, and they land in twelve identical ships which seem like particularly aerodynamic skimming pebbles. You might have seen them on the poster. Inside the pods is a long rectangular room with a groovy gravitational shift, and the first time we experience this gravitational shift is one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a film this year. In the room there’s a glass screen behind which the heptapods themselves appear enshrouded in a white mist. Finally, there’s the language that the heptapods use to communicate, the language that our protagonist, the linguist Dr Banks, has been hired to decode. Emanating from a tentacular orifice of one of the limbs of the heptapods, the language is basically a black smoky ink which forms circular symbols or logograms that on first glance look like Rorschach tests made from coffee mug stains but really is a set of unique elements that in each circle create an entire phrase or sentence. Now, I might be biased in my enjoyment of the film due to being a linguist myself, but if anything I feel like a film that involves one’s specialist subject gets put under even closer scrutiny, and the fact that there’s so much actual linguistic basis for what goes on, which I won’t go into, definitely increased how much I got into the film. This is not even touching the intriguing way the film deals with the passage of time. Towards the middle of the film, we find out a certain piece of information that changes the way conceptualise everything we’ve seen so far and everything we see thenceforth. I’m hesitant in labelling it a twist, because it feels less like a twist per se and more like another piece of the puzzle that the film represents. Though it’s still totally a spoiler, so I’m not going to say what it is. But it comes at the point where Dr Banks unlocks the secret to the heptapods’ language and in doing so is able to look at time in a completely different way. So essentially, by solving the problem of their language and learning this new way of experiencing time, Dr Banks passes on to us, the audience, the ability to see the film differently. It’s really quite a clever narrative technique. And what the revelation has to do with involves Dr Banks’ daughter, Hannah, who we see in the first few minutes of the film being born, growing up and then dying. Scenes from Hannah’s life are constantly being intercut with the plot of the heptapods, and this really adds a delicate and grounded aspect to the film. There are definitely moments when the film threatens to move into rather oversentimental territory, but its sentimentality always feels earned, or else it pulls back just before getting too sappy. And regardless, the story of Hannah, without giving anything away, is absolutely essential to our grasp of the story of the entire film. Overall what impressed me was the scale of this film, the way it tied together a worldwide phenomenon to a personal tale, the attention to detail with giant alien ships and tiny wisps of smoke alike, and above all the flagrant optimism for humanity amidst all the flurry of panic and division going on across the world. Arrival has captivated my imagination the way very few recent films have, and it relays a message of communication and unity that is always relevant, especially today. Arrival is out in cinemas now.   Written by Ben Volchok

Hacksaw Ridge is quickly turning into the must-see film of the year: the true story of Desmond Doss (Andrew Garfield), a pacifist army medic who saved the lives of 75 World War II soldiers without ever holding a weapon. It's that powerful combination of a visceral war film, a compelling social justice story and a very poignant biopic that always gets people talking. Audiences all seem to be appreciating a journey into the hellfire of war that leaves them with more than just a feeling of pointlessness. Critics all seem to be praising the juggling act of depicting such huge scale events on such a personal level. As always, I’m sure the Academy will be very generous with a film telling such an important historical true story. Meanwhile, everyone looks thrilled to see director Mel Gibson bringing himself back into the Hollywood good books. Screenwriters Robert Schenkkan and Andrew Knight chronicle the personal life, early rejection, spectacular heroics and later veneration of the first conscientious objector to win the Medal of Honour. As a Seventh Day Adventist, he refuses to ever physically harm a fellow human being, takes the seventh commandment - “Thou shalt not kill" - in its most literal sense, and recognises Saturday as the Sabbath. Throughout his military training, his superiors and fellow soldiers find all of this supremely irritating. They think he's just trying to get an extra day off, that he's doing all this for attention, that he's a coward who’s too scared to fight but too ashamed to stay at home, or that maybe he’s just insane. Sergeant Howell (a surprisingly credible Vince Vaughn) tries both the stick and the carrot, neither of which can persuade him to leave. Captain Glover (Sam Worthington) tries to convince him that the better translation is "Thou shalt not commit murder," which apparently doesn't apply in a time of war, although of course once you start making exceptions it’s hard to know where to stop. That said, Doss has no political sympathies with Japan. Just like his beloved brother, Hal (Nathaniel Buzolic), Desmond is determined to protect his country on the battlefield, even though their jobs in the shipyard would have made both of them eligible for deferment. As Desmond sees it, the only difference between him and his brother, or any of the other soldiers, is that he wants to serve his country by saving lives instead of taking them. In his words: “With the world so set on tearing itself apart, it don't seem like such a bad thing to me to want to put a little bit of it back together.” This is the climax of the speech he eventually has to give in front of a court martial, which is, in the film at least, the tipping point of his stalemate with the military. While they are moved enough to reconsider sending him to prison, they are still far from truly understanding his views. Needless to say, the day after the Battle of Okinawa, after he spends the entire night trawling through enemy territory rescuing mutilated soldiers, they all come to respect him, and his beliefs. As Glover puts it, the soldiers might not all believe the way he does, but they believe in how much he believes. Similar to Chris Kyle, whose life was chronicled in Clint Eastwod’s American Sniper (2015), Desmond quickly becomes the stuff of legend, someone who makes the men feel as safe as you can when you're heading into battle with the ruthless Japanese forces. Unsurprisingly, given that this is an American depiction of the war, the Japanese soldiers are largely demonised. After being talked about throughout the first half of the film, and having their handiwork shown by truckloads of bleeding corpses, they make their first appearance in a long, gruelling battle scene, one that perfectly balances chaos and suspense. They are essentially portrayed as scary goons to be blown down. Most of their dialogue isn’t even subtitled. There's really only one character among them, the commander who would rather die than surrender, though he appears far too late to really humanise the enemy side. Every atrocity they committed is foregrounded, so as to prevent the morality of the war effort itself being called into question. Meanwhile, over in the American camp, an array of the usual colourful characters are introduced from the beginning, though fortunately none of the cliches actually end up playing out. They all feel like real people, probably because most of them actually were, but even the invented or composite characters avoid becoming stock soldier stereotypes. Still, apparently it was too much to show any of the misdeeds they would have been party to on the American side of the battle. Even though the action scenes excel at capturing the scale of the conflict, they end up missing quite a lot of the complexity. However, Hacksaw Ridge was never meant to be a docudrama about the Second World War. Above all else, this is Desmond’s story, and thankfully the complexities of his religious, ethical and personal beliefs are explored much more fully than the intricacies of the war. The film introduces a harrowing childhood incident where, as he and Hal are fighting, Desmond picks up a brick and strikes his brother over the head with it, almost killing him. It also depicts their father, Tom (Hugo Weaving) as a raging alcoholic, who Desmond comes very close to shooting in the head when he attacks his mother, Bertha (Rachel Griffiths). This might be a fictionalised and exaggerated version of his early life, but it does retain the essence of the part his upbringing played in shaping his values, and later his choices. For instance, he first meets his future wife, a nurse named Dorothy (Teresa Palmer) on the day that he rescues an injured stranger from a fallen cart, drives him to the hospital and makes one of his many blood donations while he's there. Once he eventually gets to the battlefield, it looks as though this one poignant little story might be swallowed up by the historical monstrosity that is World War II, but it isn't. The battle on Hacksaw Ridge was certainly great and terrible, but to those who knew him, Desmond Doss was even greater. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas.

The audience at La Mama Courthouse demanded encore bows from the cast of Rust and Bone on the night of its Victorian premiere performance, which they very humbly gave and most definitely deserved. Caleb Lewis’ three-pronged play asks a lot of its actors, and quite a bit from its audience as well. A trio of male performers - Luke Mulquiney, Adam Ibrahim and Glenn Maynard in this production - play out three of the stories from Craig Davidson's collection of the same title. Ibrahim plays a SeaWorld whale trainer whose leg was torn off by an Orca, Maynard a fading boxer in need of someone to fight for, and Mulquiney a crazed dog fighter who's struggling with his infertility. The narratives are all interspersed, such that Lewis needs to carefully choose when to switch from one to the next, director Daniel Clarke has to think carefully about how to transition between stories, and the actors have to be ready to change gears in an instant. As well as that, each of them needs to have the range to play all of the key supporting characters in the other two stories, most memorably a vigorous American boxing trainer, a bouncy surrogate son, a long-suffering wife and a lively new girlfriend. It’s always impressive when actors can play different ages, genders and nationalities without falling into stereotypes or farce. It certainly changes the equation when multiple stories are being told at once. It can make it harder for the audience to orient themselves at the beginning, and easier for them to drift away in the middle. The strong characterisations certainly help here, as does the very tight choreography by Ingrid Voorendt. For her, a boxing punch, the shattering of rust and bone, becomes a very effective motif to express the torment of these three characters. It definitely makes for the cleanest transitions, and, if nothing else, snaps the audience out of any confusion. Certain parts of each story feel very similar and almost interchangeable, which often seemed intentional. Of course, all three protagonists are men who are frustrated with the limitations of their bodies, and who loathe themselves much more than those around them ever could. There’s always something exhilarating about watching parallel lives play out in such tantalising proximity, both literally given it’s a small stage but also in terms of their inner experiences, even if their outer experiences might be wildly different. Making this many hops between the three stories, Lewis doesn't always land gracefully. Not all of the threads get tied securely, and some of the most thought-provoking moments are barely given any breathing space. No doubt, for each audience member, one narrative will probably emerge with all the connections intact while another might have a few pieces missing for them. It all depends on what makes a greater impression on you: the spiritual escapism of the whale story, the primal intensity of the boxer's tale or the urgent pathos of the dog fighter's plight.

Blaque Showgirls is a merciless interrogation of Australian racism in the form of a stage parody of dance movies, including, of course, Showgirls (1995). Written by Nakkiah Lui, the acclaimed Aboriginal activist and playwright who recently worked on the ABC’s Black Comedy, it’s a play that mocks and borrows from film and tv in equal measure. Eugyeene Teh’s set design even resembles a television set as well as a theatre within a theatre, something that director Sarah Giles takes full advantage of. Voiceover abounds instead of theatrical asides. Jed Palmer’s musical score provides the cheese while the cast brings the delicious ham. Humorous captions race above the actors’ heads, and are easy to miss unless you’re paying close attention. Naturally, it ticks of all the obligatory dance movie scenes, albeit with more than a slight twist: a “montage of moderate success”; the arrival-in-the-big-city scene; the audition poster that blows into our protagonist’s face at just the right moment (here the wind is a stagehand carrying a pole); the jealous antagonist dancer throwing a tantrum at her dressing room mirror just before she hatches her third-act scheme. Lui’s story follows the blundering young Ginny Jones (Bessie Holland) an orphan from the town of Chitole (pronounced shi-toll). She dreams of moving to Brisvegas and joining the Blaque Showgirls. She might not be black, but she refuses to let that stop her, no matter how much people mock her for it. Apparently her mother was the best Aboriginal dancer in the country. She is adamant that she can remember looking up at her brown face when she was a baby, just before she was accidentally killed during smoking ceremony that apparently gave Ginny brain damage. In any case, the local Indigenous community are happy to see her go. One elder in particular, her would-be mentor figure (Elaine Crombie) is fed up with her thoughtless lack of cultural sensitivity and is happy to let Brisvegas knock some sense into her. It doesn’t. The moment she steps in to audition, she is brushed aside by the indomitable star of the show, Chandon Connors (Crombie again) and her arrogant but airheaded manager, cheekily named Kyle MacLachlan (Guy Simon). This is when the sprightly Molly (Emi Canavan) comes to her aid. She is the Japanese hostess of a club called the Kum Den, and, just like the Blaque Showgirls, she has had to make a living off selling her culture to white people, most of whom assume she’s Chinese and refuse to be corrected on it. She offers to help Ginny if she will later help her. All Ginny needs now are some culturally appropriative dreadlocks and an Aboriginal dance teacher. She finds one named True Love Interest (Simon again!) with crudely painted-on abs. Of course, all of their scenes together are built from the worst “dramatic” dialogue ever written for the screen. This part of the satire is probably the most fun to laugh at, since it makes everyone in the audience feel smart and sophisticated. Ginny is just generally good for a laugh right from the beginning, although, for the white members of the audience, the amusement turns to more of a self-reflective cringe once you realise who she really is. She’s not just clueless, she really is selfish and wilfully ignorant. As much as she might seem like one, she’s hardly an underdog, given that all the real power over the Blaque Showgirls is held by the unseen, ghostly white board of directors. Surprisingly, even True Love Interest has more substance than she does, and unsurprisingly, the formidable Chandon turns out to be much more than just a self-obsessed diva. As the most powerful Aboriginal woman in Brisvegas, poised to rise up through the ranks of the company just before Ginny showed up, she is actually the closest thing we have to a hero here. However, in writing this sly revelation of our racism past and present, there is one trap that Lui very nearly falls into: she does make more than a few jokes at the expense of Ginny’s supposed brain damage and speech difficulties, enough for the audience to start linking it to her social ignorance. Of course, fighting racism with ableism basically defeats the purpose, though fortunately she doesn’t dwell on it too much. Also, towards the end of the play there is a priceless gag attacking wheelchair inaccessibility that is rather redeeming. The lasting feel left by Blaque Showgirls is one of utter frustration with the way things have been, still are and probably will continue to be for a while. It’s a hard-bitten, feel-good and then feel-bad comedy that tricks you into caring. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas.

As fantastic as it is to see Arrival gaining so much traction, I do hope that Amy Adams’ other big release, Nocturnal Animals, still gets enough attention. Tom Ford’s second feature, after A Single Man (2009), sees Adams playing an equally sleep deprived but much less scholarly professional at the peak of her career. Susan Morrow is the jaded owner of a glitzy contemporary art gallery, a realist in a world that is anything but reality.  She first entered the creative world when she wanted to a bohemian herself, back when she was engaged to Edward Sheffield (Jake Gyllenhaal). Edward was just the kind of carefree romantic that her mother, Anne (Laura Linney), had always hated, and Susan has always hated her mother. She only has one scene, naturally the one where Susan announces her engagement, but that’s all we really need of her. She's the classic classist, conservative parent that any protagonist would want to rebel against, especially by running off with someone she looks down upon. Being married to Edward was supposed to stop Susan turning out anything like her, but, just as Anne warned her she would, she soon finds that he isn’t enough for her. The last thing she tells Susan, before they basically never see each other again, is that no matter what they do, everyone eventually turns into their mother.  All of this is told through flashbacks. The present-day Susan is married to the much more ambitious and money-minded Hutton Morrow (Armie Hammer). They’re the kind of business couple who spend more nights away from each other in hotel rooms than they do at home. The world of the gallery where Susan works is an eerie mix of avant-garde artistry and sterile opulence. Funnily enough, it’s very reminiscent of the modelling universe of The Neon Demon, especially since Jena Malone and Karl Glusman are in the cast of this film as well. That said, most of the film takes place away from this narrative anchor, as it were. Ford is well aware that those tumultuous years with Edward are much more interesting than Susan’s current life with Hutton, even if the divorce is foreshadowed a bit too overtly. Many more years pass until she hears from him again, with the delivery of his latest manuscript for a novel entitled "Nocturnal Animals" that is dedicated to her. He used to call her a nocturnal animal when they were together, since even then she was a night owl. The book is a shockingly violent thriller about a family that go out on a camping trip in the middle of nowhere. After they've driven outside of any phone coverage, they are stalked, run off the road and harassed by a local gang. The dad tries to outplay them and get his wife and daughter to safety, but their assailants end up holding him down, forcing the two women into one of their cars and taking them far away, leaving him behind feeling useless and powerless. This is definitely the most intense, drawn-out and harrowing scene that this film delivers. Understandably, there were quite a few walkouts when it reached its darkest point. Most films only hint at or threaten to show these kinds of horrific occurrences, but this one goes much further with it than anyone was hoping. Still, it's integral to setting up the gruelling revenge story of Tony Hastings, the survivor of the attack, whose wife and daughter were both beaten, raped and murdered, leaving him with nothing but the raging need to find the men who did this to them. Often when films contain stories within stories they end up feeling quite trite and idle. They're usually told with wall-to-wall narration, an overdone fairytale aesthetic and double-casting that makes for some very overwrought allegory. Sometimes, funnily enough, it's very hard to be invested in a story that you know is fictional inside the world of the main story, even though the whole film is fictional anyway. However, the story of the novel inside this film adaptation of Austin Wright’s novel, Tony and Susan, is definitely not your average meta-narrative. It’s told so straightforwardly and given so much screen time that it almost makes you forget about the central story. In fact, this could have easily been just a single narrative film about Tony, although that would have been incredibly depressing. If nothing else, it's a relief when Susan puts the book down and returns to her unsatisfying but much less traumatic life. Compared with Edward’s novel and the romantic flashbacks, the main plot is pretty stagnant, with a much greater focus on characters than events. It certainly needs the two side plots to give it momentum, but equally both of the side plots rely on the central story to give them a more complex purpose. There is still a striking resemblance between Edward and Tony, not least because Gyllenhaal plays both of them, but even so their connection is much subtler than you’d expect. In one of the flashbacks, Edward defends himself against a bad review by saying that all authors write about themselves. Indeed, both him and Tony have been called weak by people with varying definitions of weakness, and strength. Eventually, both men decide that people see strength as cruelty, and they are done with being weak. By the same token, Tony’s wife, Laura, is basically Susan, although this connection is slightly veiled. Laura isn’t played by Adams, but, in a very inspired casting choice, she's portrayed by her startling lookalike, Isla Fisher. The allegory is there but it isn't being forced under a spotlight. It doesn’t have to match the main story beat for beat to make itself known. This is what makes Nocturnal Animals both a fascinating film to pick apart and a totally engrossing one to lose yourself in. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

F. is a theatre production by Riot Stage, a youth theatre company based in Melbourne. It is part of Poppy Seed Festival, Poppy Seed is in its second year, it aimed producing shows made by independent and emerging theatre companies. F. followed a lives of a group of teenagers, it was composed of short scenes playing out different stories throughout the show, they sometimes became connected and it all ending in a huge stylised movement and piece. These explored all sorts of themes around being in the world as a teenager in modern Australia. It focused a lot on mental health, queerness and sexuality, the internet and consent. F. felt like a devised show, but it was written by Morgan Rose, the writing was very naturalistic, almost as if it was verbatim. Stylistically it was very beautiful it had a strong and clear aesthetic and mood,  the lighting design was very beautiful and precise, although I liked the sound design, I felt like I wanted a bit more, the space F. was performed in was pretty big, sometimes the space felt empty, I feel like it could have been filled up with a creative use of sound design. The performances from the ensemble were fantastic; it’s great to see a youth theatre still going strong after the youth arts funding cuts. I was sad to see that only the names of the ensemble were listed in the program and they didn’t get a full bio, I can’t wait to see what these performers move onto next. I felt very connected with many of the characters, the stories they told were very relatable and very realistic. F. was a delightful, dark and intelligent work by a fantastic ensemble of young people. It gave a great insight into what it is like growing up in Australia today in the age of the Internet. F. has been the most diverse show in Poppy Seed, the lack of diversity within this festival has been disappointing, I hope to see more diversity in years to come, including cultural background, ability, and it would be great to see Poppy Seed giving space for theatre companies from a rural area. I also feel disappointed in the lack of accessibility to the festival venues, the butterfly club has no wheelchair access and I called the trades hall in Carlton and they said wheelchair access was very tricky. To me, being a theatre maker and artist should mean allowing access to people of all abilities to your shows, this may mean diverting funds from other places to book venues that are a bit more expensive but accessible, making sure there is Auslan interpretation and audio description, these things may be expensive but I think it is important, theatre and art should be for everyone. These issues aside Poppy Seed is an excellent initiative, should and needs to be supported so that they can afford to make the changes they need to with accessibility and diversity, they give independent and emerging artists a great space to explore and put up work on at a main stage, which is exciting and a great addition to Melbourne’s theatre scene, so let’s keep supporting it and making sure future theatre makers get the same opportunity. F. is showing at The Trades Hall in Carlton South until December 11th. Written by Ebony Beaton.

Ken Stone and Irene Silber’s Hard to Believe is a tight 56-minute exposé of an issue that few people like to think about: forced organ harvesting in China. It isn’t exactly a secret that the Chinese government performs surgery on its political prisoners without their consent, but in recent years the media has largely neglected this still very present atrocity. This documentary, which mostly looks at the communist party’s persecution of Falun Gong spiritual practitioners, is Stone and Silber’s great effort to bring this issue back into the spotlight, to push past the compassion fatigue that most Western citizens in particular seem to be feeling. Most of the interviews here have been conducted with American Human Rights Defenders Torsten Trey and Ethan Gutmann, who urge people to realise that these horrific violations will never be stopped if everyone just keeps waiting for someone else to fight the fight. It seems to Trey and Gutmann that if this was happening anywhere other than in China, one of the most powerful global economic players, then the international outrage and protest would be much louder and stronger. They also suggest that the problem feels too large and abstract for most outsiders to really comprehend. The human impact of these practices can easily to get lost in the sea of statistics, or indeed in the literal sea that divides China from most other countries in the world. While the short running time does make the film easier to digest, and could well encourage some of the more apathetic people to actually see sit through it, it doesn’t really allow Stone and Silber enough time to explore the issue in quite enough detail. On top of that, far too much of this time is spent listening to these two white social commentators, while any interviews with the victims of this abhorrent system of exploitation are something of a rarity. In fact, out of the interviewees who are actually Chinese, the one who is given the most screen time is a perpetrator, not a victim. We hear a great deal about how prison doctors are being coerced into stealing the organs of their patients while they are still alive and fully awake. We also hear some of the telephone calls made by people wanting to purchase these rare healthy “criminal” organs. There’s no denying that these are both crucial things to cover, but this should not be at the expense of the voices that have already been horrifically suppressed. If anyone is going to be made the face of forced organ harvesting, it should unquestionably be one of the victims. While Gutmann doesn’t believe it’s fair to expect these people to advocate for themselves, since most of them don’t have the legal or political expertise, the idea that none of them have the skills or the capability to fight for their own rights is something I actually do find Hard to Believe. Political campaigning might work very differently in the West compared to China, but that does not in any way mean that the Chinese people can’t speak for themselves in the international media, or that they need a white saviour to fly in and rescue them. In some ways the most, and in other ways the least controversial approach this film adopts is to compare the organ harvesting in the Chinese medical system to the Holocaust. Even though they are both large scale atrocities that were at least initially met with global denial and apathy, we are now unfortunately at a point where this is a very commonly invoked comparison that people have become almost desensitised to. I’m not sure what it would take to shake the rest of the world out of their inaction, but an acceptance of the Chinese people as the leaders of this cause and as the voices of their own national problem would certainly be a start. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

Roger Ross Williams' latest feature documentary is about a 23-year-old autistic man who's obsessed with Disney movies - basically, me, if you just wind his age back two years, move him from America to Australia and rotate his sexuality 180 degrees. In light of that, you'll have to forgive me since I can't exactly distance myself from what is pretty much my own biography. Mostly, I was just overjoyed to see a real person that I can relate to standing on the screen in front of me. I feel like I've earned that given how much of my life I've been looking at that screen. Not only is he obsessed with something that is neither maths or IT, he is also not a little kid: he is a self-aware adult, and fortunately Williams knows how to treat him as such. Unlike the subjects of most other autism documentaries, he is old enough to reflect on his own past and current experiences of friendship, love, and coming of age, and he is actually given the space here to share his reflections. Owen Suskind, the man in question, has watched every single animated film that Disney has ever made, and memorised every single line of dialogue. Most of these stories and characters have been a part of his life for as long as he can remember. They have a place in his heart and mind that goes far beyond their nostalgic value. Why does he love Disney so much? This is probably the only question he never answers for us. Not that I blame him, I wouldn’t really know where to start with that one. It’s just such an integral part of my psyche, of my personality and identity that it really would require me to step outside of myself to explain where that obsession came from and why it has endured. Owen’s parents talk about the comforting predictability in watching these same movies over and over, not only in that individually they never change but also that there are certain things you can always expect from a Disney animation, such as a happy ending. They also think it might be that the softness of the animation gels well with his sensory hypersensitivities, or the fact that the characters are, ironically, both very colourful and very black and white in their design. It’s a pretty clinical and simplistic explanation, but it’s not a bad start. What the film itself suggests, even if no one explicitly says it, is that these movies are a thrilling escape into a very different universe, a “whole new world” if you like, filled with endless possibility. The life of an autistic kid in a non-autistic world can be painfully lonely. Of course, Owen himself describes better than anyone else just how crushingly isolating it is. You want to make friends as much as anyone else does, but everyone you meet just dismisses you as the “weird” kid. By the end of primary school, the word “weird” can start to feel like a hateful slur. Everything about you that is unique, everything you love, everything you do, your entire identity is pushed aside and pigeon-holed into this single, meaningless category that no child wants to be a part of. Both Owen and I eventually gave up trying to play with other children and would play with the Disney characters instead. You still have fun that way and enjoy being a child. They can actually feel like good substitutes for friends. Up to a certain point, they fill that gaping hole. Even when you leave the house, you can spend ages revisiting them in your mind. Owen still likes to recite some of their best lines to himself when he’s out and about, in the way that most other people might sing to themselves. It’s also satisfying to make your up your own stories about them in your head. It’s the closest you can get to actually bringing them to life, and, until you finally learn to accept yourself and start to be accepted by others, this is the closest you can come to being a hero. At about the age of ten, Owen had written and illustrated a hundred-page story about all of the wise and quirky Disney sidekick characters, naming himself the “protector of the sidekicks” who kept them safe from the monster terrorising the forest that was their home. It’s easy to see why Owen identifies so strongly with these funny or sage-like side characters. As someone with unusual mannerisms and very specific interests, if this was any other movie he would most likely be a side character. He would be cast as the helping hand to the ‘relatable’ hero, put there to provide laughter when things got tense, wise words when things got rocky, and hi-fives when things turned out well for them, but his own aspirations, fears, goals and longings for companionship would never be considered. You can tell a lot about a person by the characters they identify with the most, especially when they’re not the ones you’re supposed to feel represented by. In this production, Owen’s story of the sidekick is brought to life in some dazzling animation sequences by the team of Matthieu Betard, Olivier Lescot and Philippe Sonrier. I can easily imagine just how excited Owen must have been to get that rare opportunity of seeing his childhood fantasies on screen. Equally, the scenes showing the Disney club he started with his fellow Neurodivergent friends are some of the most moving and satisfying moments in the film. I am happy to say that Owen has definitely not been made the sidekick in his own story. One of the many benefits of choosing an adult subject for an autism documentary is that you can show them taking their life into their own hands and making it better. Owen turns what used to be his sorry substitute for friends into a way to meet and connect with like-minded people, real people who will always be there for him. It also turns out to be a way for him to meet Jonathan Freeman and Gilbert Godfried, who pay the group a surprise visit and do a live reading of Jafar and Iago, their respective parts in Aladdin. Of course, the other important opportunity given by Williams’ choice of subject is that of exploring romantic relationships. Owen’s conversations with his girlfriend, Emily, who is also Neurodivergent, sound unhealthily strained. In many ways autistic people can be said to have their own language, and their own way of communicating. This is why an autistic person who is asked to communicate the way non-autistic people do will sound a bit like someone who is speaking in a language that is not their native tongue. It is quite strange that Owen and Emily would feel the need to speak in a neurotypical way when it is just the two of them, but there is obviously a force of habit at play. It is interesting that Life, Animated focuses quite a lot on the movie Peter Pan, seeing as there is this tendency view autistic people as children who never grow up, just like the lost boys. Certainly, on the surface, people like Emily and Owen might sound and look like children, but it is hard to know whether that is just the way they naturally carry themselves, or whether it is because they are usually spoken to as if they were children, which leads them to think that that is how other people like to be spoken to. In this manner, a lot of the medical and clinical studies of autism are very chicken and egg. The only trap of infantilisation that this film really falls into is its suggestion that Owen basically doesn'tknow what sex is. Sex is another thing that can be especially complicated for autistic people, but, unlike friendships at school, it is surprisingly easy, at least to a certain point, to convince yourself that it doesn't exist (after all, non-autistic people pretend that's true all the time when they talk to each other). His older brother and close mentor thinks that Owen actually doesn't understand it at all, mostly because he could never have learned it from watching Disney and because Owen's been very unresponsive any time he's brought it up. However, just because he doesn't like to talk it about with his brother, or on camera (which is far enough) doesn't mean he knows nothing about it. Nevertheless, Williams does give Owen ample opportunity to speak for himself on camera, and also to express himself through his impressive illustrations, as well as, of course, his favourite Disney scenes. He rounds off the film with some footage of Owen opening an international autism conference: a powerful reflection of the social progress of the past several decades. I can certainly understand how strange it must have felt, to be a 23-year-old who has fast-tracked their way to the big time thanks to their exotic brain. Unsurprisingly, Owen finds it hard to pen down everything he has to share into just one little speech, and asks his father, Ron, what he should say. Ron tells him that it is all up to him, that it's his story to tell, which is ironic, considering this film is technically based on the book that he wrote about his son's life with autism. Even so, by the time he is able to stand up there and present himself as a proudly autistic adult, his family has finally realised that he is not a lost boy, he is a man who has found himself. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

There’s something incredibly uncomfortable about seeing a show about poor people by non-poor people, essential for rich people in one of Melbourne’s most highly regarded theatre venues. Blessed explores the lives of Maggie and Grey, two poor people who fell in love as teenagers and had heaps of fun, then Grey disappeared for ages and Maggie found him in a disgusting apartment, they talk about their past and what they’ve been up to and then towards the end it turns out that Maggie is pregnant and is the mother of god. The play ends with a beautiful monologue by Maggie about how her son is going to be a kick-arse god. Blessed has been described as an ‘insight into the lower class’ and as someone who grew up in a family with very little money, I honestly just find that offensive. It was a grossly one dimensionally portrayal of people from low-socio economic background, it portrays us as drug addict, angry, hopeless people with weird accents, it portrays us as people with no agency and no control over our lives. Of course that may be the case for some people with a poor background, but what good is it doing putting it on stage that the vast majority of the audience will be from a privileged background? The characterization of Maggie and Grey did no favors to the script, I felt completely unsympathetic towards either of them, in particular Grey, who was played as a ‘crazy’ angry verbally abusive man, an insight into the lower class?  Nope, you’re just further stigmatizing them. I think Fleurs writing was really beautiful, but I cannot think what the director was trying to do in his interpretation of Fleurs’ script. I think the script really could have worked with the right director. It was a funny play, I could see the humor trying to break though but the direction, set and sound design was forcing the audience to suppress that, it forced us to feel pain, from the scratchy, grim sound design to the aggressively invasive flickering lights during every single scene change. I found myself drifting off and disengaging at multiple points in the play, mainly because I felt like I was just being yelled at and I’m not really interested in being yelled at, but also because I found it so ridiculously unrealistic We got to see flash back of when Maggie and Grey first met when they were 15, and I had a few problems with this – the same actors played their younger selves, which just seemed silly because they were taking it so seriously and forcing the audience to take it seriously, I wish they had have gotten actually younger actors to play these scenes, I think it would have been a lot more effective, or at least do something drastic to the lighting or costume during these scenes, it was so weird for it to be just in the same setting and lighting but the actors ‘acting 15’.  And on that note, I found the portrayals of 15 year olds really disingenuous, they seemed like they were playing 6 year olds to be honestly, if I was a 15 year old I would be offended. Blessed is one of four shows part of Poppy Seed a theatre festival for independent theatre makers. Despite my negativity, Poppy Seed Theatre Festival is something everyone should support, and encourage. Check out their website to see what else they have on offer. Blessed is showing at The Malthouse until the 20th of November. Written by Ebony Beaton.

This review contains mature content and language and pretty major spoilers about the show. Straight up, Anti-Hamlet was one of the best productions I have seen this year. It was absolutely trilling, and so engaging it left me exhausted and unable to get up from my seat, which is always a very special experience that I’ve only felt twice before I loved it so much that I was it two times in it’s opening weekend, but not only because I loved it, but because it was so complex and intelligent I think I had to see it twice to get a stronger grasp of what it all meant, the first time seeing it was like being a twig thrown into a whirl wind, and coming out the other side with flowers growing all over me, but not knowing how they got there. The second time I saw it, I was able to process the content of the work with a deeper sense of comprehension, which was very rewarding. That being said, you don’t have to see Mark Wilson’s phenomenal work twice to fully appreciate it as a production. Nor do you have to have a deep understand of William Shakespeare Hamlet, I came to the show not knowing much about Hamlet. My friend I went with gave me a quick recap of story before we were ushered into the theatre. I think knowing Hamlet would be very helpful but not essential, I think having a small knowledge of it would be fine. Mark and his perfectly picked collaborators took Hamlet, gave it a good shake, tipping out all the language, and political context of the late 1500s, and replaced it with a magnificently crafted contemporary script, filled with references to currently Australian and world politics. They kept much of the structure of the original Hamlet, but set it in modern Australia, they still called the location they were in Denmark, like in the original Hamlet, but it was very clear that it was a substitute for Australia, I suppose to make it less on the nose. In this plays reality, Denmark is a constitutional monarchy, a referendum is going to take place, and if passed make it a republic, making Claudius played by Marco Chaippi, the current Prime Minister, the President of Denmark. Claudius seemed to be an amalgamation of Liberal Party leaders. Gertrude was still the Queen and Hamlets mother, played very luxuriously by Natasha Herbert. Hamlet was still the prince, played by Mark Wilson, re-worked to be a Melbourne academic off-the-rails-student-prince, turned anarchist. Ophelia, played by Natascha Flowers was reworked to be a clear headed Rhodes Scholar graduate of Oxford, that works for Claudius in hope to insight social change around the treatment of Asylum Seekers. Horatio, Hamlets friend in the original play played by Marcus McKenzie was still used by name in the play, but he’s character is less of a friend to Hamlet and more of a re-occurring character that helps or interacts with Hamlet, such as a busker Hamlet gives a $5 note to, and a stage manager or Hamlets one man show, Marcus, also plays ‘The Anti-Hamlet”. Two more characters were worked into the show, who replaced characters of the original text. Polonius reworked as Sigmund Freud, played magnificently by Brain Lipson and Laertes reworked as Edward Bernays, played astoundingly by Charles Purcell. Sigmund Freud was played as himself, but as a psychoanalyst for the characters in the play. If I had to choose Edward Bernays was my favorite character, he was a manipulative, powerful 1950’s talkin’ American man who helps Claudius become the president of  Denmark. Like Freud, Bernays was a real historical figure, who basically invented propaganda, and is a very interesting man, look him up. The ensemble of performers were shockingly good, and just perfectly cast. All the performers had crafted their characters in such an astonishing way, with real depth and meaning. The set and costume design by Romanie Harper was elaborate, clean and beautiful, the stage was framed with scaffolding with a lusous red curtain around the perimeter. The costumes for each character matched very well, especially Gertrude, who I think, had a different luxurious gown on in every scene. Amelia Lever Davidsons lighting design beautifully complimented the set, costumes and performances. She created electric atmosphere with her wonderful design. The sound design by Tom Backhaus was crafted nicely to fit into the show. It worked to the advantage of the dialogue heavy script, and intense aesthetic of the production.   The story Mark created in his new adaption Anti-Hamlet was so complex and intellectual; I really don’t think I could do justice recounting it. It was beautifully nuanced and at times meta. It had a perfect balance of comedy and seriousness. Something I really admired about this production was how far the cast and creative team pushed the boundaries. One of the stand out moments in this production was the final scene of the first act, where after being told by Freud that all of Hamlets troubles would be solved if Hamlet had sex with her, Gertrude takes Hamlet into her ‘closet’ and invites him to fuck her. Hamlet succumbs and tries to but can’t get an erection, he tries to masturbate, but can’t. At this point we hear Freud behind the curtain masturbating, Hamlet is filled with rage and naked, runs to Freud, pushes him behind the couch and kills him, covered in blood he screams “I have killed Sigmund Freud!” while holding up his decapitated head wrapped in an Australian flag and then the curtain closes in front of them, I was left dazed and unable to speak. There is multiple other moment in the play that had this effect on me. The commitment and bravery shown in this play and in this scene in particular are what I love about seeing and making theatre, seeing artists be brave and uncensored in their words and actions is inspiring and beautiful. Anti-Hamlet presented by Theatre Works and New Working Group is confronting, political, breath taking and thought provoking, New Working Group are shaping up to be one of my favorite theatre groups, the bravery and talent of these artists is incredible and extremely inspiring, particularly for a young theatre maker like myself. Do your self a favor and go see this show, and it runs about 2 and a half hours with intermission, so make sure your well fed before hand. It is now showing at Theatre Works in St Kilda until November 13th Written by Ebony Beaton.

Derek Cianfrance's The Light Between Oceans is something of an epic, operating on quite a small scale but still putting its characters through some formidable challenges. It's based on TL Stedman's novel of the same name, one that suggests both intimacy and profundity. This story does eventually deliver on both, but in the film at least, the intimacy is there pretty much from the get-go. It sets itself up to be a charming love story about a mild-mannered lighthouse keeper (Michael Fassbender) and his lovely wife (Alicia Vikander) who live on the Island of January between two oceans. It is December, 1918. Tom Sherbourne was a lucky survivor of the Great War, though with no loving family to come home to and no reason to believe that he has any right to be alive after so many have died. As he is first getting to know the sweet young Isabel Haysmark, he tells her he has done some unspeakable things in the years he spent on the front, though he doesn’t go into any detail. For him, the noble occupation of a lighthouse keeper is a way to give something good to the world, to help others when they most need it, but to do so from afar, without having to look into their eyes and receive undeserved gratitude. He never envisioned sharing this new life with a wife and child, but almost immediately after she meets him, Isabel is determined to court him, marry him and give him a family. She manages the first two of those easily enough, but after two miscarriages that final dream of hers is looking unlikely to come true.   Cianfrance doesn't spend too long on their burgeoning romance. He mostly just shows them sharing their different experiences of the war. Isabel lost all three of her brothers, and is now an only child. She notices how, unlike a wife who might tragically become a widow after the war, there is no special name for what a parent becomes if they lose their children, or for what a sister becomes if she loses her brothers. To her, it is a connection that cannot be severed, the kind of love that never dies, even if the person it was for is now dead, or never even had a chance at life.   Conversations like this one are peppered throughout the film, particularly in the initial stages of the plot. This is one of the more well-written deep and meaningful dialogues to be seen here. Others are markedly more on-the-nose, such as Tom explaining all of the mythological symbolism of the island, or one that has a certain crucial supporting character reciting one of the morals of the story: “You only have to forgive once. To resent, you have to do it all day, every day.” These are all very worthy, weighty sentiments, but some of them are gratingly overstated and seem to arrive just in time for some not-so-subtle foreshadowing.   Unsurprisingly, the film is at its most effective when it communicates its ideas through sounds and images - especially one striking shot that makes the ocean feel just like a desert - and when it simply trusts the strength of its story. After a generous amount of romantic and tragic setup, the real story is carried over the waves towards the little island with those two tiny graves. The couple spot a dinghy drifting near the shoreline, with a dead man and a crying baby girl lying inside it. Isabel is desperate to keep her. For all they know, she has no one. If Tom puts this in the log book, she'll probably be sent to an orphanage. Isabel convinces him to pretend that she's theirs, to Christen her Lucy Sherbourne and literally raise her as their own, an apparently victimless crime that might just rescue all three of them.   Years later, however, when Tom discovers there that there is indeed a victim still suffering from what they did to her, he fears that they have damned themselves to a lifetime of punishment. It turns out that the dead man in the boat, the girl’s biological father, was a German man named Frank Roennfeldt (Leon Ford), the one who later espouses the virtues of forgiveness in a romantic flashback. Unfortunately, his new overseas neighbours weren’t quite as willing to bury the hatchet so soon after the war. He got into that boat out of blind fear for his own life, and even more so the life of his tiny daughter, who he had named Grace. Meanwhile, his wife, Hannah (Rachel Weisz) was left behind to erect a tombstone for both of them on the mainland of Australia.   Strangely enough, that is where the film is set, even though its three main actors are Irish, English and Swedish and use more or less English accents. Cianfrance has tried to create a believable sense of place by shooting some of the scenes in Tasmania  and filling the supporting cast with well-known Australian actors like Jack Thompson and Bryan Brown, who all act in their native accents. It’s a pretty discordant mix, but it still amounts to some very evocative cinematography and many solid performances. Unsurprisingly, Fassbender imbues the world-weary war survivor with a genuine sense of humanity, Vikander brings an unexpected dark streak to the loving mother with no child to love, while Weisz is consistently engaging as the wounded wildcard who stirs things up to an exceptional level of moral complexity. There are an awful lot of films that start with an excitingly unique premise that then just tapers off into cliché, but, interestingly, The Light Between Oceans begins in a fairly predictable way and becomes more interesting and sure-footed as it goes along. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas.

Julieta is the latest film by Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, based on three short stories by Canadian writer Alice Munro. The eponymous lead character is depicted in the present and in flashbacks through a diary she is writing in a sort of cathartic fit. From the flashbacks we learn of Julieta's life, her joys and more specifically her tragedies, of which there are several, spanning everything from her parents to her daughter to her love. Some have criticised the film for being emotionless, for retreading themes familiar to Almodóvar's previous work  - such as loss, passion and parent-child relationships  - in a lacklustre way. But I would in fact argue the opposite. In the words of Almodóvar, this is a "dry, tearless film". Such was his intention when shooting, so much so that he specifically told the actors not to cry. So really, Julieta is not so much about the emotions felt when grieving as the lack of emotions felt when grieving. The empty hole you find yourself in. The depressive chasm loss pushes you down. And I thought he captured this elegantly and tenderly. Perhaps the most epitomising image for me was a scene where Julieta is in such a pit of depression that her daughter has to bathe her; there she is, in a bathtub, naked and drenched, and still not crying. Just numb. I was very much moved. Capping this all off are grounded performances that internalise and consolidate the drama, and a complementary score by Almodóvar regular Alberto Iglesias, as well as the vibrant, evocative and rich colour schemes that Almodóvar is famous for, which here serve to contrast with the resounding emotional absence. Julieta for me is among his finest work, and a truly affecting portrayal of grief. Definitely very much recommended. Julieta is in cinemas now. Written by Ben Volchok

If you’re fan of that strange nostalgia that comes from witnessing old Hollywood glamour, Café Society might just be for you. Complete with a backdrop of wonderfully detailed fashions, an upbeat jazzy soundtrack and in the company of presumably rich, carefree socialites, Woody Allen’s latest venture is a rabbit hole into that bygone era of Hollywood romanticism. Set in the late 1930s, Café Society details the life of the young and naïve Bobby Dorfman, as he sets foot in Hollywood, eager to make a name for himself. Using the connections of his powerful uncle, he is given a front seat to the glitz and glam of Hollywood life. However, for all it’s glory and lavishness, Bobby finds himself more infatuated with his uncle’s secretary, Veronica, or rather, Vonnie, as she’s called. From here, a messy and bittersweet romance unfolds itself and brings Bobby back to New York, where he runs a high society night club with the support of his colourful and eccentric family. The film is delivered with a light-hearted playfulness and charming sense of humour. And through this whimsical setting, Café Society departs a rather sympathetic view towards the fickle and impulsive nature of love and its effect on relationships. Whether or not you agree with the character’s choices throughout the film, it’s clear that Allen isn’t afraid to have them dwell on their feelings and in many cases explain their positions in the form of conversation and argument. There are numerous scenes throughout this film where characters unabashedly proclaim their different ideals and philosophies on life, on relationships and whatever else. It’s here that Allen really shines, able to create incredibly natural dialogue full of conflict and energy, yet never loses its sense of wit. In this sense, the constant shifting from party, to restaurant, to dinner table really sells the heart of this film: A Café Society obsessed with itself, full of moral ambiguity, mindless gossip – all drenched in a layer of pretention. And what’s not to love? It’s difficult to resist the allure of it all, especially with the detail they have put into the setting. Here, many of the background characters spring to life. Just through little snippets of dialogue and interaction with the main cast, Allen manages to carefully construct many vibrant set pieces that suck you in. In terms of the performances, Jesse Eisenberg plays, well, Jesse Eisenberg. His stuttery and seemingly perpetually-nervous performance of Bobby is to be expected at this point, and save for a few scenes, it’s acceptable for the most part. Surprisingly, Kristen Stewart sets the bar as the mysterious and ever down-to-earth Vonnie. Though I never thought I’d say this, the muted and generally stoic demeanour that has copped her criticism in the past actually comes off quite refreshing in a sea of endlessly flamboyant characters with rapid-fire speech patterns. In concluding this review, I’d like to make a somewhat embarrassing and shameful confession: I have not seen a Woody Allen film. There, I said it. Now, whether this discredits my authority on the quality of this film or perhaps, leaves me unclouded to whatever preconceptions his previous works may given me, that is up for you to decide. But I will say for sure, from what I’ve seen so far, I’d like to see more. Café Society opens to cinemas everywhere on the 20th of October. Written by Victor Cai

Nicolas Winding Refn's The Neon Demon would have been, I imagine, quite an easy film to pitch, but a very hard one to describe. Since seeing it I've been explaining it to people as "the Black Swan of modelling,” which might sound very reductive, but given how much it invites comparison with Darren Aronofsky's film, I wouldn't be surprised if that's how Refn had originally conceived it. Both of them begin by introducing a gifted but naive young woman wanting to enter into a soul-crushing profession, one that they short-sightedly think they can handle without losing themselves completely. This time around, we have 16-year-old Jesse (Elle Fanning, giving, to date, the best performance of her career) a natural beauty who wins over everyone with simply her radiating  personality. At first, she is aware of this great power she possesses, but only somewhat, only enough to know that, as a girl with no real professional skills and no family or friends to support her, her looks are something she can make money from. Her lack of any personal connections is never explained, but there's no denying it's effectiveness as a writing tool. It makes Jesse a clean slate, a mysterious wanderer with a murky past. Every other character in the film is someone that both she and the audience are meeting for the first time, and so every relationship she forms with them is seen in full, from its very beginning. Two of the most memorable people she connects with are a budding photographer, Dean (Karl Glusman), and a more experienced model, Ruby (Jena Malone) who both take an interest in her, for whatever reason. Out of all of Jesse’s modelling peers, Ruby is the only one to show her any kindness or to offer her any guidance. Funnily enough, she is also the only one who doesn’t have blonde hair, a choice that’s about as subtle as anything else in the film, which gets more expressionistic as it goes along. When a film opens with a vivid wide shot of a blood-splattered girl lying still in a bathtub, followed by a closeup of a young man coolly taking pictures of her, you certainly get an idea of what you’re in for. True to the name, just about every scene in The Neon Demon is bathed in a fluorescent glow, and just about every frame is filled with objects that catch and reflect that glow. However, there is definitely more than just one demon to be found here. Most of them are female, with ghostly faces saturated in makeup, who go from discussing the “Red Rum” brand of lipstick in front of a mirror to eventually turning into literal blood-sucking, flesh-eating monsters. Of course, this is all meant to represent the dangers of the modelling industry, all the harmful things it teaches to young girls and the kinds of women they apparently have to become in order to win over the male modelling agents and fashion designers. Naturally, a lot of this will be common knowledge amongst the audience. While Black Swan took place in the world of ballet, a profession that most people see as benign, respectable and not at all self-destructive, the modelling industry has been under public scrutiny for a while now, so it is doubtful that an emotional, rather than an intellectual film will bring anything new to the table. Still, as annoying as it is to see yet another production about women fighting each other for a man’s attention, it is a pleasant surprise to see a film that commits to having a female protagonist, several female antagonists and a few male supporting characters that remain as much all the way to the end. That said, you can still tell this was written and directed by a man. While some of the scenes between the models are quite clearly heightened, others feel more like a version of group female interaction rendered more comprehensible for men. If it weren’t for his co-writers, Mary Laws and Polly Stenham, I imagine some of the dialogue would have probably turned out even more stilted. Still, the five lead actresses always find ways to make their characters convincing, despite the absurd things they might end up saying or doing. Certainly Elle Fanning, and Melbourne actresses Bella Heathcote and Abbey Lee, all shine in the most intriguing roles they have ever been offered. It’s particularly interesting to hear the two Australians using their native accents in an American production, a subtle reminder that models, unlike actors, are seen but not heard in their profession. Unsurprisingly, Christina Hendricks portrays one of the better stone-cold industry gurus we’ve seen onscreen in a while, and Jena Malone, possibly taking inspiration from Mila Kunis, is genuinely cryptic as the suspicious Ruby. Dean, on the other hand, very quickly proves himself to be a true friend of Jesse’s, and apparently the only decent person in sight. He suitably ends up going head to head with the two most despicable male characters: the fashion designer that all the girls want to be chosen by (a curiously uncredited Alessandro Nivola) who gets to say “beauty isn't everything; it’s the only thing”, and Jesse’s vulgar landlord (Keanu Reeves) who embodies every reason why a woman might be afraid to be out alone at night. Jesse’s power is not just her beauty, but, most importantly, her honesty, her moral integrity, her pure intentions. Initially, she simply wants to make a living and has no wish to step on other people’s toes. Her power comes from the fact that she’s not even aware that this is a power at all. The films presents us with a fascinating paradox when as soon as this neon demon realises how powerful she is, she is rendered powerless, and defenceless against the real demons she thought she could take on. Her pivotal transformation scene, about 90 minutes in, turns out to be the most stylised, well-paced and hypnotic part in the film. Rather than drag out the inevitable with a series of more realistic scenes, Refn wisely chooses to compact this character change into one fluid, dialogue-free sequence, which would have worked brilliantly as a final or penultimate moment. Unfortunately, though, we then end up spending half an hour with this brand new version of Jesse, which, as it turns out, we might have actually needed more than one scene to get to know. There soon comes a point where the style turns into excess, the characters turn into caricatures, the commentary just becomes comedy and the macabre expressionism turns into a full-on gore-fest. Strangely enough, I eventually got a little tired of watching the main character die, in many different ways, and slowly stopped caring if this was another fantasy sequence or if this time she had actually died for real. It’s always hard to know, not because of the complexity of the writing but more because it’s unclear what Refn expects us to accept as realistic and what we can safely assume to be fantasy. There are only so many fake murders that one little Stanley Kubrick reference can justify. I’m sure that the multiple death scenes are meant to show how this profession is slowly killing her from the inside, destroying her piece by piece. It’s a valiant effort to shock us all into sharing his anger, but by the end of the film, just before Sia’s ‘Waving Goodbye’ plays over the end credits, it looks like he’ll be getting more laughs than anything else, which is not to say that The Neon Demon fails as an art film, but rather that it succeeds as a late blooming horror flick. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

La Mama Theatre’s The Masque of Beauty seems to have taken its name from Ben Johnson’s courtly masque composed in 1608. However, in Peter Green’s ‘Renaissance Cabaret’ we certainly feel far away from the England court, even if he uses a few Shakespeare passages on one of his literary medleys. Green’s writing, and indeed Faye Bendrups’ directing, both take Australian audiences to very different theatrical territory than they might be used to. True to the form of a masque, this show is a meandering hour of live music, dance pieces, dramatic scenes and chorus style songs, which historically would espouse the most famous figures of the day. On this particular outing, to the Italian court, we encounter three formidable sisters-in-law – the notorious Lucrezia Borgia, the sharp-witted Isabella d’Este, and the worldly Elisabette Gonzaga – as well as the controversial Pope Alexander VI, his son, and Lucrezia’s brother, Cesare Borgia, the Monna Lisa (“constipated for over 500 years”) and a very nervous young Leonardo da Vinci. This production might have done away with some big hallmarks of the masque – the actual masks, the decorative sets and the audience participation – but aside from that, it really does feel like a journey back to the 16th century. 21st century audiences are very used to narrative-based entertainment, and to more visual forms of storytelling, whereas the figures displayed here are introduced much more through monologue than dialogue. Even the grim ensemble songs feel much more like an Ancient Greek chorus than an exchange played out in song. In these parts of the show, the four voices of the cast - Maria Paula Afanador, Madeleine Field, Claire Nicholls and Jessica Greenhall – seem to blend into the one entity. The dances and the more physical scenes function more as further illustrations of the figures than as a way of driving forward a story. I call them ‘figures’ instead of ‘characters’ because they are far from being active players in a dramatic narrative. The Masque of Beauty is, throughout, a consciously historical work. More specifically, this is revisionist history, and the sardonic kind at that, based on rumours and re-evaluations. This piece is undisguisedly looking backwards, and makes no attempt to make us feel like we are looking forwards as though we and the performing ensemble don’t know what’s coming. The cast and creatives are certainly in the know, but unfortunately, for the most part, their audience is probably not nearly as knowledgeable about it all. The commentary on Leonardo and the Mona Lisa works because this is a part of Italian history that is very much general knowledge. As for the three noble sisters-in-law, as fascinating as they seem, and as exuberantly as they are portrayed, they aren’t really part of the public consciousness. The production team might now know almost everything there is to find out about them, and they certainly seemed to find their commentary on them amusing and compelling, but I’m not sure that a lot of their audience will. It’s definitely a more obscure part of history, something the La Mama staff seemed to have picked up on. At the box office, each audience is member is given a Wikipedia blurb on each figure in the story, which helps a little but it still takes more than a couple of hastily read paragraphs to achieve that same level of familiarity. I’m sure those who know the history of the Italian royals will appreciate what this talented team manage to do with them, but those who don’t are never really brought up to speed at any point here, or at least not in any helpful way. There is often a large disconnect between what you are being told on stage here and what you are being shown. When the exposition becomes particularly intricate and hard to follow, it is very easy to be distracted by the other stagecraft elements and miss certain factual details. You can definitely feel that this is set in a world of seduction, corruption, manipulation and murder, but it’s very hard to be clear on who is doing what to who, and why. Seeing as there is no real narrative movement anyway, or even much thematic movement here, those who aren’t already familiar with all of these people will probably feel start to feel a bit restless. It’s definitely a treat for any Renaissance aficionados but will probably be quite unmemorable for anyone else. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

Hell or High Water is a 2016 film written by Taylor Sheridan and directed by David McKenzie. Set in blistering rural Texas, it focusses on two brothers, played by Chris Pine and Ben Foster, who rob banks, and a cop on the verge of retirement who is chasing them, played by Jeff Bridges. There’s action, there’s tension, there’s laughs. Tonally, the film carries itself with a particular relaxed, laid-back nature that seems to befit the type of life present in small-town Texas. What makes this tone so much more appealing is how well it complements the more intense moments of the film, of which there are plenty, with much of the film’s runtime being taken up by bank heists, car chases and shootouts, and more. Adding to the fun of the plot is a real sense of humour which shows up not just in the banter of the various main characters but also in the dialogue of the various minor or incidental characters that pop up, including a very memorably dismissive elderly waitress in a steakhouse. The film explores some interesting themes relating to poverty and capitalism, and the central premise of the brothers stealing from the banks that are stealing from them is an irony that serves the film quite well. Unfortunately, it’s an irony that is too often stated rather overexplicitly, meaning the way that the issues are treated is too on the nose to have proper weight. I would have preferred to see a more subtle approach to dealing the social commentary, an approach that can in fact be seen in the film, particularly in the ways that it raises certain moral questions, but it’s an approach which is obscured by the numerous bits of dialogue that make it painfully obvious. Likewise, the soundtrack seems piled on a bit too high. For some reason the filmmakers felt it necessary to add songs underneath every second scene until there was little room for anything else to tell the story. It’s a pity because there’s an absolutely fantastic central score done by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis which truly gives us a feel for the setting and works with the visuals to create an interesting mood. It’s just not given much breathing space because of how overstuffed the rest of the soundtrack is. Clever but not quite clever enough, if nothing else this film is a lot of fun and is definitely better than your average crime drama. Hell or High Water opens October the 27th. Written by Ben Volchok

“Sharp, smart and hysterically funny!”… “A cult hit….gleaming with comic polish.”… “A frothy, sill, saucy and spectacular affair.” These are just some of things critics have said about 5 Lesbians Eating A Quiche, a play written by Evan Linder and Andrew Hobgood, currently being performed for Melbourne audiences as part of the Fringe Festival. And it was the reviews that initially attracted me to the show, although, as I realised afterwards, no words could really describe what I had witnessed. The year is 1956, right in the middle of the Cold War and the constant threat of a nuclear disaster. It’s in this context that we meet the Susan B Anthony Society For The Sisters of Gertrude Stein – 5 feminist widows who are preparing to celebrate their annual Quiche Breakfast. The 5 women who star in the play are hilariously drawl and camp, and absolutely obsessed with quiche. They tremble and coo as the time for the first quiche tasting draws closer. At this point I thought the play had already reached peak absurdity, and I was wrong. Suddenly, right after the first quiche tasting, a nuclear bomb goes off and the women are thrown into survival mode. The good news is that the Susan B Anthony Society For The Sisters of Gertrude Stein centre is bomb proof and they have enough rations to last 4 years. The bad news is that they’ve left the rest of the quiches outside. And as I said, these women really really love quiche. I’m not going to spoil the rest of the play for you, but let’s just say that the action rises into higher and higher levels of absurdity in such a clever and shocking way that you’re left on the edge of your seat. The play is flawlessly acted, and sends up the naivety of the white female suffragette with incredible sharpness. In particular, Lauren O’Rourke, who plays a  slightly hysterical and very enthusiastic southern belle, is wet-your-pants funny, particularly when she takes her first bite of quiche and basically has an orgasm. After the show, I felt utterly entertained, but a little flat. It’s hard to critique this show, but I’d say that the storyline was possibly a little one-dimensional. There was no real tension between the characters – they all had the same motivation – and there was no self reflection within the script. I think I would have liked this story better if one of the characters, at some point, stepped outside the story world and questioned it, or helped me relate to it to my 2016 perspective. Then again, that’s perhaps what the show is playing on – the fact that the original American feminist movement, the values and beliefs of these women, can look absurd from a modern perspective. Perhaps, in another 60 years, they’ll be making fun of today’s feminists in absurd comic plays. Instead of a quiche breakfast, it’ll be a feminist club meet up over lattes at a hipster café. Written by Beth Gibson.

Francofonia is the latest film by Russian director Alexander Sokurov, who is perhaps best known for his 2002 documentary Russian Ark, an ambitious and awe-inspiring one-take trip through St Peterburg’s Hermitage museum during the Russian Revolution. In Francofonia, Sokurov once more returns to the themes of art and war and museums, this time focussing on the Louvre during the Nazi occupation of France. As someone who doesn’t get on terribly well with documentaries, I found Francofonia rather intriguing as it played with the documentary form and fused narrative with truth and reconstruction, past with present. We see Napoleon wandering the halls of the museum, we see the German officer in charge of dealing with the Louvre meeting with the then head of the museum. Sokurov himself narrates the documentary and appears on screen as one of the film’s central figures, talking to the characters while also being depicted as trying to piece the film together and not knowing how because the nature of culture is too overwhelming. But the film itself is not a failure – the nature of culture is overwhelming, and this is intentionally presented in the daunting and elusive way that it is. The fragments of history are all woven together in a way that urges us to draw our own conclusions in the way that Sokurov tries to over the course of the film. While at times disappointingly Eurocentric in its analysis of culture and the significance of culture, Francofonia still provides plenty of food for thought. What is culture? How much is it worth and who needs it? Who has a right to it? Perhaps the most interesting facet for me was the parallel drawn between Germany capturing the Louvre during its invasion in WWII and Napoleon invading other countries during his reign and bringing back countless artefacts to be displayed in the Louvre. Plus there’s a lot of fascinating snippets about the museum’s formation and the particulars of what it went through during the Second World War. Complex and at times confusing – in a good way – Francofonia has a lot to offer, even if we have to do a bit of work to piece it all together. Francofonia opens October 6. Written by Ben Volchok.

Hi, it's Adalya with my second review from this years Man Booker Prize shortlist. This week I'm looking at Deborah Levy's Hot Milk. Hot Milk follows Sofia and her mother Rose as they travel from England to clinic of questionable merit in Spain, seeking answers to Rose's litany of mysterious ailments. Set in the searing heat of Southern Spain, Sofia undergoes a twisted iteration of the classic beach sexual awakening narrative while Rose undergoes Dr Gomez's treatment. As the reliability of the mother who so shapes Sofia's life and identity becomes shaky, the importance of her relationship to her father and his Greek heritage becomes a new fixation. Levy's writing is lucid and evocative. Images recur, morph and intermingle in unexpected ways. Her exploration of what it means to form an identity around illness and what it means to form an identity in inverse to somebody else is arresting and important. We are drawn immediately into Sofia's inner world, a stilted filter on reality. Even the dialogue felt unnatural, characters voices indistinguishable from Sofia's own. At times this claustrophobia was transfixing, but at times it felt like there were links we were missing. Perhaps it was the many strengths of Levy's work that left me feeling so ambivalent towards the end product. Despite its compelling subjects and beautiful prose, Hot Milk lacked any real sense of cohesiveness. Ideas and narrative were not coherently woven together and the result was just a sense of loss at what could have been. The scenes in Greece, for example, could have occurred at almost any place in the book, so separate they were from any other element. Hot Milk is by no mean's Levy's first work, so I think these failures felt greater than they would have had it been a debut. To be honest I am surprised and a little disappointed that Hot Milk made the shortlist. I haven't read the full longlist, but for me, The North Water and My Name is Lucy Barton at least were both stronger works than Hot Milk. All that said, I know there are lots of people who have loved and will love this book. I think perhaps a difficulty in reviewing book and especially books nominated for a prize is that the craft of the work is placed on equal footing to that craft's effect, whereas I think when we read a book without this consideration the effect is our primary interest. Hot Milk did not come together for me, but perhaps it would have if I had not had reviewing it in the back of my mind as I read it. With last years Booker for example, lots of writers I saw felt that, although they had been profoundly emotionally involved in Hanya Yanigihara's A Little Life, that the strings used to emotionally effect us were too present for Yanigihara to deserve the win. I think this is a reasonable and even important consideration to make, but I guess it does beg the question why or even whether it is worth paying attention to these awards at all if their priorities are so different to that of the average reader. I guess the very fact that I've undertaken this project means that I must think they are, but I think it is important to act in dialogue with the institutions you give power to. Please stick around next week as I continue to discuss the rest of the Man Booker shortlist and question the very premise of this project!

Thursday, 1st September marked the seventh year for the Korean Film Festival In Australian (KOFFIA). ACMI hosted Melbourne’s festival and invited guests to share canapés of kimchi, cocktails and listen to traditional music on the Gayageum. This festival boasts twenty newly released and critically acclaimed Korean films, however it was the film titled 4th Place, written and directed by Jung Ji-woo, which opened the festival. Commissioned by the National Human Rights Commission of Korea, 4th Place delves into the brutal world of competitive sports and questions whether, in the pursuit of success, does the end ever justify the means. Opening with a black-and-white prologue, we are introduced to fresh-faced competitive swimmer, Kim Gwang-su (Jung Ga-ram), who has been tipped as Korea’s future for Olympic success. After returning from practise and looking for dinner, he meets one of the swimming reporters Young-hoon (Choi Moo-sung) and they both partake in a night of heavy drinking. Despite this, Gwang-su swims exceptionally well the following morning and is on track to break records at the International Competitions in the next few weeks. Confident with his progress and times, Gwang-su cuts practise to gamble and drink, missing vital training sessions. His coaches eventually find and punish him for his recklessness, through the method of caning him with wooden pool brooms. After coping several lashes, he storms out of the complex and alerts Young-hoon to write a report about these acts of violence. The storyline skips sixteen years on, now in colour, and focuses on eleven-year-old swimmer Joon-ho (Yoo Jae-sang). Despite high expectations placed on him by his mother, Jeong-ae (Lee Hang-na), he only seems to place fourth at junior competitions. Through the power of prayer and persuasive donations she tracks down a competent coach with unorthodox training methods. Enter Gwang-su (Park Hae-joon); a husk of the once professional swimmer, and now a worker at the local aquatic centre. It starts out with the common sports narrative; an apathetic coach, whose glory was snatched away prematurely during his youth, meets a competent underdog who has a chance at the success he missed out on. Gwang-su commits himself to the project and, as he becomes more desperate to win, his relationship with Joon-ho gradually becomes violent. He begins beating the boy in the same fashion that his coach did to him when he was a young swimmer. Gwang-su plays both the aggressor and consoler; comforting Joon-ho that it was for his own good and that he’s inspiring ambition. The relentless pressures to succeed bleed into Joon-ho’s dreams, and it becomes more apparent he only wants to win for the sake of others. His own drawing of a gold medal hanging on the wall above his bed is enough for him, but it cannot satisfy his mother or Gwang-su. Even after his mother discovers the bruises on his back, Joon-ho is pushed to continue training, in light of his recent second-place win. No one steps in until Joon-ho’s father accidentally learns about the coach’s brutality, and even then he only bribes the coach with money to stop caning their son.  Jung’s artfully constructed film points to our performance-driven culture, unhappy with anything less than first place. Lee’s performance as Joon-ho’s mother perfectly embodies the overbearing and paradoxical weight of society’s expectations for each child to be a winner. Park Hae-joon, playing the older version of Gwang-su, is riveting to watch; he has the ability to both terrify and charm, a technique that works on Joon-ho and the audience. A noteworthy scene from the film is where the mother is walking back from the church with her youngest son, Ki-ho (Suh Hwan-hee), and he asks what she prayed for for each family member. She prayed for Joon-ho to come first, and for Ki-ho to attend college when he’s older. When he asks about her own prayers she states she prayed for “nothing” for herself. Her children appear to be her biggest achievement and treats their achievements as her own. Jung navigates the heavy topic of child abuse with sensitivity and grace. It is littered with light-hearted exchanges between all characters and captures the complexity of human nature. It is also beautifully shot, especially the underwater dreamscape scene where Joon-ho tumbles around the shimmering lights refracting underneath the surface of the water. My only criticism is that the relationship between Joon-ho’s father and coach was not fully explored, and as a result Gwang-su’s admission at the end of the film was a little underwhelming. 4th Place will screen in Adelaide’s Palace Nova Cinema on Thursday, 15th September and in Perth’s Event Cinema on Thursday 22nd of September. Written by Erin Connellan

On Tuesday, the Man Booker Prize Shortlist was announced. For those of you not in the know, the Man Booker is a prize given for what the judging panel deems to be the best novel written in English and published in the UK each year. For many including myself, the Booker is the Prize to watch, the AFL Grand Final for nerds. This year's shortlist consists of: Paul Beatty's The Sellout Deborah Levy's Hot Milk Graeme Macrae Burnet's His Bloody Project Otessa Moshfegh's Eileen David Szalay's All That Man Is Madeline Thien's Do Not Say We Have Nothing The Booker somewhat controversially opened the prize up to all english speaking countries in 2015 (previously only awarding the prize to those in the Commonwealth), and this years longlist contained notably more american authors than the one that preceded it. For the next six weeks I'm going to be looking at each of the Man Booker Shortlist picks, with occasional help from some of your other favourite Smitteners, talking about why these might have made the shortlist and who might take out the final prize. I am excited and a little scared and I hope you all enjoy the journey.  Now onto my first review. Do Not Say We Have Nothing, by Madeline Thien, has somewhat cynically been described by many as the classic Man Booker pick, for its complex, political, intergenerational narrative.  The novel begins in the voice of our youngest character, Marie:  "In a single year, my father left us twice. The first time, to end his marriage, and the second, when he took his own life."  From here, Thien takes us back to the start of the Chinese Communist Revolution, through the Cultural Revolution and up to the Tiananmen Square Riots.  I think from the distance of the West, it is easy to lose the human impact of international tragedies, particularly when they star people of colour. I am one of few people I know who was presented a unit on modern Chinese History in high school, and even this had gaping holes in it. If you do not already know a little about the events Thien is describing you will not be completely lost, however you will probably find yourself compelled to seek further reading once you've put the book down. Through Thien's characters, the widespread devastating personal impact of these events is impossible to miss. There is an almost folktale like character to the events of the distant past that is slowly stripped away as we are brought through the horrors that her characters sustain. Thien explores characters that are often not wholly good or evil, but shaped by circumstance. She carefully examines those who are influenced into acts of violence and betrayal, treating them with care but without total forgiveness. Her characters cannot be completely redeemed from what their political context has condemned them to. Music is heavily weaved through one generation of the families in particular. Studying classical music, I am often wary of novels that invest parts of their narratives in music. To me, it can often feel like pretentious name-dropping at best and often adds little to the story. To get a bit less literary, it sometimes feels like the scene in Pitch Perfect where Beca acts like David Guetta is some underground, unappreciated genius. To me, Thien was not too heavy handed. The pieces referenced were not the absolute standards and were described in terms of the emotions they induced rather than just as name-drops to remind the reader that the characters enjoyed music. Knowing the works was a bonus but not necessary to understand what she was trying to evoke in mentioning them. I will say some of these references went over even my head, as, as a self-centred violinist, I am less familiar with piano works that were often discussed. The books one weakness was something common to many works coving such a large time period and cast. Although for the most part, Thien's characters felt remarkably well realised, Marie, whose voice starts and ends the book,  was not as strong as I would have liked. We see small snippets that are supposed to provide character—that she studies maths for instance—however we never truly get to understand her in the way we do her predecessors. When we start to delve well and truly into the past I was not quite content to leave the present, and whilst details of the dual narratives slowly serve to illuminate one another, I never felt like I was quite done witnessing Marie's own experiences. I think it's also worth mentioning that Thien's prose is impeccable. Although she moves between different styles of story telling, no voice felt less powerful than any other and the choices made in differentiating them did not feel arbitrary. She pushes the narrative forward with a compelling lucidity that makes the book difficult to put down, no mean feat for such a complex work. Do Not Say We Have Nothing is a powerful book on an important topic, however it is not for this reason along that I believe it has been shortlisted for the Booker. Weeks after reading it, I still feel profoundly affected by Thien's writing and characters in a way that is rare. Although I am a little disappointed Marie's character wasn't explored more deeply, I would still not be at all upset if this book ended up taking home the top prize. Written by Adalya Hussein

Rupert Burns is Kelvin Campervan. Or is Kelvin Campervan Rupert Burns? They seem to get along pretty well in the one body, but can never quite decide who is the artist and who the creation. The one man show explores the nature of a person's relationship with themselves and their history. It is set from the vantage point of mid life, but even at my age of 21 I was inspired to be existential about my own history of years and to ponder their value, as well as the missed opportunities I have already tasted.    I would have to compare the performance, to any Harry Potter fans out there, to the 'ridikkulus' spell. This magic is designed to defend against the mysterious being called the 'boggart', that tends to hide under beds and in cupboards, and transforms into people's greatest fears when discovered. The spell 'ridikkulus' works by altering this fear, forcing the boggart to take on a ridiculous aspect. For example, if you are terrified of giant spiders, then the giant spider will now be wearing roller skates and slipping all over the place. The thing boggart's hate most is laughter, and when you laugh, it loses its power. Burns hit flush those existential fears that will attend us all in our lives with his magic.  He has very successfully converted that profound unease at ageing, missed opportunities and faded dreams into  laughter and contentment. He shows us the other side of the abyss, which is still an abyss, as Kelvin reminds us - 'I learned that there was no ceiling to the universe...I also learnt there was no floor'. It is a very true sort of freedom he describes. Burns achieves his aims through the most unusual, hilarious and quietly beautiful ways.   We witnessed Kelvin levitate before our eyes, contort his body into the most freakish positions, devour his own tongue and order a group of perfectly trained wonderdogs to literally jump through hoops as he willed it. I won't ruin the performance, but know that while these amazing feats are in one way completely flawed, for me, they emphasised a simple and elegant critique on our existence. Such amazing things we dare to aspire too in youth: I wanted to be an astronaut, for example, and an artist that was famous by the time they were eighteen, and also, an AFL star. I didn't do those things, and yet, even though I essentially dreamed to levitate, as Kelvin does, I did something which was equally as funny, exciting, interesting an engaging for myself and those around me. And that is, as surprising as that is, sufficient. Things will get sad at times, as the best theatre and comedy does. For when Kelvin gets you laughing again, it is so much sweeter. Kelvin Campervan's Mid-life Crescendo is playing until the 23rd of September showing every day except Monday between then and now. It's a short and highly palatable show at only 45 minutes long, so prepare for a wild and bright adventure that is guaranteed to please. Written by Jim Thomas.

Phil Rouse decides to introduce his production of The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui with a very peculiar sight: some slides of Elizabethan text hover above our very skilled ensemble as they are all club dancing to ‘Turn Down for What.’ It’s one of those audacious mixes of the highbrow classical and the lowbrow modern that the theatre world can never get enough of. Arturo Ui (played here by George Banders), the fictional Chicagoan crime lord, is of course Bertolt Brecht’s parodic and blatantly allegorical version of Adolf Hitler, rendered comprehensible for an American audience in 1941. Since the play took 22 years to make it to Broadway, it has only ever been performed in front of already well-versed audiences, and never as an introductory education on the history of Nazi Germany. Before they’ve even sat down, this 2016 Australian audience will already hate the infamous dictator just as much as the play’s 1963 American audience would have, but their prior knowledge of Brecht and Epic theatre will be less certain. In this production, Rouse bombards the audience with countless lines of text for the same purpose that Brecht once did: to give the audience all the facts they need to follow the allegory and understand his message, without being “distracted” by the fictional story he is telling. In contemporary theatre making this is known as heavy-handedness, but in the 1920s the idea of using theatre to shamelessly recruit people as political activists was a novel and exciting one. However, even today Rouse gets away with it by embracing this style of alienating the audience from the pathos of the story, and by having his own anti-right wing political agenda to parade around. The text on the screen and a handful of throwaway lines make it abundantly clear that Donald Trump is the politician he is truly taking aim at, with the original Hitler allegory itself becoming an allegory for a much more contemporary issue. There is also another, much more subtle comparison made between the Great Depression and the Global Financial Crisis, which interestingly is pulled off without the assistance of the fact slides. However, there are times when the three story levels, one literal and two allegorical, feel like they are about to crumble in and collapse on one another. It was also a questionable choice in the otherwise sound set design by Martelle Hunt to put the screen so high above the actors. Much of the opening dance sequence and character introductions will likely go unseen by audience members who are reading the opening text, and likewise, many important pieces of text shown throughout the production will go unread since there is rarely anything to direct people’s attention all the way up there. This is why Brecht would project his text at the back of the stage, so that it was always in view. Also, despite all the text, the self-aware jokes and the intentional breaking of character, there is one Brechtian technique that Rouse uses only very sparingly: bright lighting. There is a brief moment where the entire theatre is strongly illuminated and an awkward false curtain call plays out, but, for the most part, Rob Sowinski and Bryn Cullen’s lighting design is surprisingly traditional, putting the audience at a very comfortable distance and ultimately making the viewing experience too passive for this sort of material. Part of the intention of a show like this is to disorientate the audience, to pull them out of the story and keep the focus on the message, but until the very end of the play, the message within the message tends to make the space outside the story just as murky as the story itself. Fortunately though, each time both the narrative and its social significance become unstable, there are always the characters to fall back on. One of Brecht’s greatest inconsistencies was that, despite his frequent postulations on the importance of emotional distance, he had an irrepressible knack for writing vivid and endearing characters. Here we have the ruthless Ernesto Roma (Peter Paltos), Ui’s tough mentor in crime who turned a spineless common thief into a deadly rabble-rouser with the nerve to eventually kill him. In a “parable play” that draws heavily on Shakespeare, and even goes as far as flat-out copying a few scenes from Richard III, Roma, and his real life counterpart Ernst Röhm, are both the Banquo and the Lady Macbeth in Ui and Hitlers’ origin stories. Paltos not only masters his menacing presence, but, with the right makeup on, he also happens to look a lot like Laurence Olivier. Of course, the other standout characterisation here is Ui himself. Banders certainly has the right stuff and isn’t afraid to get up close and personal with the audience while in character. He consciously breaks the fourth wall in a glorious moment of theatrical self-reference and, in one scene, he impressively manages a dexterous run through the audience. Thanks to the talents of Banders, Paltos, Brecht and Rouse, the great anti-hero and his seedy keeper have a life beyond the confines of the allegories, something they probably weren’t supposed to have in theory, but in practice is really what allows this piece to work as a two-hour play. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas.

On Thursday night I showed up at La Mama ready to see The Ribcage Collective’s new work of experimental theatre. The Ribcage collective are a collaborative group of young theatre makers from varied theatrical backgrounds. For a second year running they have written, devised and performed works of immersive, sight-specific theatre at La Mama in Carlton. Their previous show was described by ArtsHub as “an intimate theatrical experience enough to reawaken a childhood sense of play”. That sounded pretty good to me. At the beginning of the evening we found out the recent arts funding cuts had just forced the closure of Platform Youth Theatre, the organisation that had brought these performers together. The kind of theatre we were about to see – youth-driven, experimental – is becoming harder and harder to make, even though it seems essential that young people have opportunities ambition, funded work. The show was based around a new Australian myth written by the group. It followed a family through three generations and a lot of hardship – from earth to hell and back again. The myth was told by a woman dressed as the sun; a “very wordy sun” as my viewing companion put it. The sun was so wordy that neither of us were able to follow the story, although that didn’t necessarily matter, we were told, because the three acts that made up the bulk of the work were also designed to be experienced separately. The audience was split into two, each group led by a guide through three site-specific pieces. The stories were vivid, each with a unique sense of place and drama. In one, a woman seems to be drowning in a bath of silver while another woman looks on, calmly smoking a cigarette. In another, a brother and sister quarrel as they are trapped in their dead fathers home. In my favourite story, a young boy philosophises with his fish, only to find the fish has come alive and is gyrating on his bed in a slinky dress. All of the stories had a great sense of playfulness and surprise. Moments like the fish coming alive, or a woman being dunked in silver liquid, were thrilling to watch. The spaces – some more ‘traditional’ than others, were cleverly used. A hole in the ceiling of one space allowed the silver liquid to be dunked secretly, a decrepit staircase became a dramatic entrance way. Some moments in the piece did feel little heavy-handed. Metaphors were either obvious – a chain is passed from actor to actor ‘linking’ the 3 pieces together – or too abstract and complex to be accessible. “What did the silver stuff mean?” someone asked later. Talking to audience members afterwards, there was a general sense of confusion – what did that mean? How did the stories link together? We couldn’t figure it out. It was a relief to slip into the Q+A session afterwards and find a panel of enthusiastic performers keen to answer our questions. It because clear how much thought had gone into every element – the metaphors may have been confusing, but that wasn’t because they lacked depth. Hearing the performers talk afterwards somehow made the work as a whole more enjoyable for me. Their thoughtfulness and passion redeemed the show’s weaker moments. It was during the Q+A that I realised we were in the company of a school group: young girls about to go into Year 12 drama. They asked about the world beyond high school plays and the performers willingly shared their knowledge. It was the innocent being led by the less innocent, a charming moment slightly overshadowed by the recent funding cuts. One performer said “There aren’t many opportunities left, so you’ve really got to put yourself out there.” Another chimed in “but if you do, you will find people willing to help.” And, if there is hope that courageous youth theatre will not only endure, but thrive, the Ribcage Collective are certainly a shining example. Written by Beth Gibson.

Kevin Smith's Yoga Hosers is one of the most bafflingly entertaining films of the year. A part-time cheesy teen movie, part-time goofy horror flick and full-time American satire of Canada, Nazis, Canadian Nazis, ‘kids today,’ and of course yoga, it never really asks to be taken seriously, just to be enjoyed. It's a follow-up to Smith's previous film, Tusk, with Johnny Depp reprising his role as the eccentric Guy Lapointe. However, it still works as a standalone film. Those who haven't seen the first movie will be a bit confused by the odd reference to a man being turned into a walrus, but with a script this off-the-wall those moments will hardly stick out. Yoga Hosers follows the misadventures of Colleen McKenzie (Harley Quinn Smith) and Colleen Collette (Lily-Rose Depp), two best friends who are almost never apart. Together, they are taking yoga classes run by Comic Side Character Yogi Bayer (Justin Long) who teaches a very unusual type of yoga. They also sing in a band together, where they mock Oddball Sidekick Ichabod (Adam Brody) their long-suffering drummer. They rehearse in the back room of the dreaded general store that they both work at. They hate their jobs. They can’t stand the customers, or the fact that they’re working for Daggy Dad Mr Collette (Tony Hale) and his new girlfriend, Evil Stepmother Tabitha (Natasha Lyonne). One day, their daily drudgery is interrupted by the arrival of Hot Guy Hunter Calloway (Austin Butler) and Gross Wingman Gordon Greenleaf (Tyler Posey), two senior students who invite them to a wild house party happening tomorrow night. However, they are gutted when Tabitha whisks her bumbling Bob away on a surprise trip to Niagara falls, purposely leaving the Colleens with the store to run on the very same night of the party. On top of that, Mean PE Teacher, Ms Wuckland (Genesis Rodriguez) has done the unthinkable and confiscated their phones for the day, which of course pretty much puts their entire lives on hold. Until they can collect them from Wacky Principle Invincible (Sassier Zamata), they might as well pay attention to Exotic Exposition teacher Ms Maurice (Vanessa Paradis) as she teaches the class a backstory about Canadian Nazis, one that will become very important once this movie's scary sci-fi subplot kicks in. Even before it does, however, Yoga Hosers doesn't feel like your typical trashy teen horror film. Evidently, as far as plot and characters go, it follows the formula to the letter, but in terms of tone it is much more sardonic than your average high school movie. For instance, the audaciously named Principle Invincible slips some biting remarks on racial privilege in between the standard routine for her character trope. She and the rest of the cast are also all in on the wall-to-wall Canada jokes. This ensemble of mostly American actors speak in a hilarious hodgepodge of their native accents, a touch of Québécois and as many oots as Smith could write into the script. Once the plot starts swerving in all sorts of directions, the fun quickly increases, and just occasionally decreases. Each twist is certainly unexpected, though largely because no groundwork is really laid down for any them before they arrive. They're not exactly believe, but they don't aspire to be. They are mostly there for novelty, not complexity, and the film only truly suffers when that novelty wears off in between the scattered climaxes. If this were an artistic film, it would probably be called an "eclectic mix" of genres and characters, but as a piece of mainstream entertainment it is more likely to be called "a mess," but what a glorious mess it is. Each subplot is basically a vehicle for the surprisingly star-studded cast to engage in some self-parody. It is very satisfying to see Hayley Joel Osment and all of the other young adult stars subverting their usual roles. There are also many memorable pop culture gags. Most of them are very contemporary, such as the uproariously paradoxical reference to Orange is the New Black. Has Collette just never noticed that her dad's new girlfriend looks and sounds exactly like Nicky Nichols? Or the actor who plays her? Oh well, who cares. Meanwhile, some of the more classically educated moviegoers in the audience will appreciate the older references, which all come from Ralph Garman's gallery of impressions. As one of the funnier Nazi caricatures that we've seen recently, Garman does flawless impersonations of actors like Al Pacino, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and even the lisping Ed Wynn (best known for Mary Poppins and Alice in Wonderland). All of these are lost on the young Colleens but Guy Fontaine is very impressed by them. It might just sound like Hollywood nepotism to have Lily-Rose Depp share scenes with her mum, dad and even her little brother, Jack, all while Harley Quinn Smith is being directed by her dad, but the Depps really do bounce off each other well, and Kevin Smith does get a good performance out of his daughter. The results here might not exactly be cinematic gold, but they are nothing like the debacle that was After Earth or The Godfather: Part III. It's also very refreshing to see a film with two female protagonists who both remain happily single from beginning to end. Yoga Hosers is silly, lightweight fun that usually knows where its limits are. It doesn't attempt to hold its audience's interest for more than 90 minutes, but it does still expect them to engage with its fight scenes, even though no suspense is ever properly built for them. Sometimes Kevin Smith seems to forget that, although the Colleens are likeable and enjoyable to watch, since there is no emotional investment made at the start, there can be no dramatic payoff at the end, even though there are plenty of comedic payoffs. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

Heavily stylised and endearingly quirky, Girl Asleep could be very easily described as “Wes Anderson does Napoleon Dynamite”, but in reality it’s much, much more than that. Sure it’s full of dorky humour and a kitsch yet meticulous 70s aesthetic, but it’s got a unique and very sweet take on the coming-of-age story. The girl of the film’s title is 14-year-old Greta, who’s just moved to suburban Adelaide and is having trouble fitting in at school. She meets another outcast kid named Elliott and the two strike up a nice friendship. Soon after, her parents decide to throw her a 15th birthday party, and reluctantly she agrees. There’s bullies, there’s sibling rivalry, there’s anxiety over appearance and romance, all the standard teenage things. It all sounds like such a simple premise. But that’s basically the point. It all sounds like such a simple premise because it is, and deliberately so: that which is generic is of course universally resonant. It’s a clever touch, as it allows the filmmakers to take this generic story and turn it into something truly original, and it means that it’s the stylistic oddities that shape the film as much as the story and characters. The visual flourishes, such as expositional “later that night” type text appearing on objects in the film or spontaneous dance sequences, are a delight. In addition, it devotes a hefty portion of its refreshingly short runtime to an intriguing dream sequence – the asleep part of the title – which plays out Greta’s insecurities, giving her closure with the people who surround her and helping her come to terms with her own changing existence. The most visually striking portion of the film, it’s also a portion that threatens to break the flow of the film and is a tad too long for what it needs to be. But I nevertheless enjoyed it and thought it matched the general mood and vibe of the rest of the film; like a true dream, it became a heightened version of the film’s reality. This is a film primarily for teenage girls, but though I was never a teenage girl I still really dug this. It’s funny, it’s a bit weird and it’s quintessentially Australian. Girl Asleep opens September 8th. Written by Ben Volchok.

Cattle, contemporaries and canapés, Eddie Perfect’s play; The Beast, promises to touch you inappropriately in all the right places. By challenging a lifestyle that conceals itself behind a facade of authenticity, the show wastes no time in establishing a humorous destabilisation of friendships; stripping characters down to their inauthentic cores. With sensitive subjects used as punchlines to boot, it’s no lie to say that The Beast works to attack and offend, although this may not be a bad thing. The larger than life caricatures seek to hold a mirror up to those who consider themselves elite in society. They grow organic vegetables and purchase “ethical” cattle in an attempt to reduce their eco footprint, although this lifestyle definitely comes at a cost when the six friends find that they’ll have to kill their own dinner. The play embodies almost each and every one of us that invests in a false perception of class. Whether it’s the food we eat, or merely the ways in which we live our lives, Eddie Perfect has constructed a hilariously self-critical comedy in which nobody is safe. No stone is left unturned, and no bourgeois attitude remains uncriticised. The play succeeds in drawing out what we hate most about ourselves and one another in the race to achieve perfection in the modern world. After having survived a fatal boat accident, Simon (played by Rohan Nicole), Baird (played by Eddie Perfect himself) and Rob (played by Toby Truslove) vow to undertake a life of ethical living. In pursuing a tree change with their respective partners, friends become neighbours and their dislike for one another hastily develops. By conveying a critical view of urbanites seeking to escape the hustle of city-living for the tranquility of the country, these characters embody every stereotype of upper-class suburban snobbery. Despite their best efforts to live an ‘authentic’ country life, their obsession with consumerism and being on-trend shines through the minimalist avant-garde architecture of their homes, acting as a comedic contrast to the regional setting. A general unlikability plagues most of the characters within the play, as they embody a misguided approach to healthy living and cultural superiority that comes all too naturally for those most arrogant in society. What could otherwise be pursued as a humble and positive approach to living is corrupted by the elitism inherent in The Beast’s subjects. Rob and his wife Sue (played by Heide Arena) are the last to make the move to the country, following Rob’s emotional breakdown from the trauma of the accident. Their arrival acts as a catalyst for the welcome dinner from hell, set up by the other characters. Attempting to face the harsh realities of ‘going bush’ the six are presented with the need to slaughter their own nose-to-tail cuisine, resulting in a bloody and horrifically hilarious display of gushing arteries and wealthy white people trolloping around in the blood of an Angus calf by the end of the first act. Struggling with the ideologies of taking responsibility for what you eat and holding a concern for animal welfare, the cast simultaneously kill and attempt to save the calf after bungling a ‘humane’ slaughter.   Undeterred by the cattle related events, the characters barely manage to regroup before the darker scenes in the second act unfold. As the narrative progresses, the characters become increasingly uneasy, eliciting a similar response from the audience. Each of the relationships presented are rife with cringeworthy ignorance, portrayed with a certain uniqueness by each individual character. Struggles with mental health are swept under the rug in a flippant display of uncaring, whilst misogynistic expressions are entirely left unchallenged. Although it could be argued that topics such as these should not be discussed with comedic aspects attached to them, it is important to realise that the humour running alongside the narrative seeks to soften the impact of the harsh reality portrayed. Despite trust and honesty being discussed in abundance between couples, the audience gains a sense of what an unhealthy relationship consists of. These characters inhabit a twisted realm where openly condoning betrayal is acceptable and ‘healthy’, while any mention of personal struggle is shameful and without class. They live in a place where pseudo-psychology has been used to justify disrespect, undermine support, and promote shame. Through elitist comments and narcissistic attitudes, these relationships are then put to the test in order to gauge just how difficult life in the country can be for those without scruples outside their own interests.   The cast carry the themes explored in The Beast with brilliant delicacy, traversing controversial dialogue whilst also grappling with a snobby perception of modernity that falsely champions free-thought and multiculturalism, all of which is easily related to by the contemporary audience. I advise against, for the narrow minded or faint of heart when choosing to attend the ‘worst dinner party ever.’ Complete with serves of steak tartare and canapés galore, The Beast is sure to captivate the audience by confronting them with a side of themselves that perhaps they didn’t care to sample. Running until the 10th of September at the Comedy Theatre, be sure to consider eating your meal after the show, as this is an event that’s sure to make your stomach turn from sheer laughter and mild trauma. Written by Thierry Falcone. 

A film that opens with a lens-flared shot of a forest is only ever going to be a particular kind of film, I thought. A twee, wilderness-worshipping kind of film with smug self-contentedness. But Captain Fantastic, written and directed by Matt Ross, is not really that kind of film. Or rather, not entirely that kind of film. Yes, it’s full of obsession over nature and that brand of anti-consumerism that we all learn during our teens that pretty much starts and ends with “stick it to the man” – but it’s a film that’s occasionally and increasingly quite charming and that allows its characters to exist as more than a mere stereotype, delving into their lives and minds. Disappointingly, though, that is only a minor achievement that doesn’t really make up for the overall lack of depth in the storytelling. Captain Fantastic centres on Ben Cash, a father who brings his kids up in the woods, training them up to peak physical and mental ability away from all the aspects of modern, artificial, commercial life. This is the life this family leads, a life that’s all-too-tragically interrupted when Ben calls to find out how his wife and the children’s mother Leslie is doing in hospital and is told that she has died. Ben Cash is played by Viggo Mortensen with his usual rugged, rough-shod manner coupled with an intensely warm paternalism. In fact the whole cast is commendable, especially considering most of them are children; they never reduce their personas into cartoons even while, for example, the eight-year-old kid reads George Eliot, or the eldest hunts and kills a deer. The way he regiments his family and has a cool authoritarian control over them is, let’s be honest, essentially one murder away from a cult. He uses his power over them as a father figure in the same way that the corporations and capitalists that he rails against do. In their world, he is the man. But they never stick it to him. They just stick by him. And it was rather frustrating that this aspect of the film was never truly scrutinised. It’s safe to say that the film’s loyalties never really stray from the side of the ironically-named Cash family. Their lifestyle is never used as a punchline, which is nice, but again not surprising given the film’s on their side. And it’s entirely clear that he loves his kids and they love him too. But their ideological standpoint is pretty much given a free pass, which is both the film’s drawcard and its drawback. On one hand it’s nice to see a film treat a group of people on their own terms, and on that front it paints a detailed and convincing portrait, but on the other hand it means that it’s never fully critical of them and while yes it’s nice as an audience to be able to conduct critical analysis on our own terms it feels like the film itself is not actively inviting of criticism. Of course, there are some moments of self-doubt and self-reflection, and actually the most engaging segments of the film come in the second half, when we start to see the cracks in Ben Cash’s parenting methodology. It’s during these segments that the film is at its best, presenting a moral dilemma and a conflict between Ben and his wealthy “real-world” parents-in-law. Unfortunately it very suddenly shifts back to its original vibe – and, without giving too much away, it seems to suggest that these conflicts were for Ben to overcome, not to learn from. There’s small changes in his attitude as he settles for a favourable compromise and slightly mellows, but on the whole he’s the same Wild Man of the Outdoors as before. Captain Fantastic is a film about a family but is not exactly a family film. I mean, can you call a film where you see Viggo Mortensen nude a family film? I’m not sure. Maybe. But it’s definitely aiming for feel-good and I can see that it will appeal to a lot of people. I just wasn’t one of those people. Captain Fantastic opens September 8th. Written by Ben Volchok

Dangerous Liaisons by Little Ones theatre is a theatrical adaption of Pierre Chodelos De Laclos novel. The story takes place in France in the 1700s, It’s a long winding story of revenge and seduction. Two ex lovers have plans for revenge and humiliation; they try to out do each other in an attempt to dominate one another.  Little Ones theatre originally staged this in 2014 at MTCs Neon festival, since then it has toured across Australia to Darwin and Brisbane and has won and been nominated for multiple awards, and is now being restage at Theatre Works in St Kilda. The set design and costume design was stunning and striking. It was a beautiful pallet of gold’s and pinks. There were shimmering golden curtains draped from the ceiling surrounding the space, with a sparkly golden floor with golden elaborate period couches. All the other props were consitant witht this colour sceme, all coloured gold, they appeared to be spray painted. The costumes were all period and lovely shades of pink. The script was very dense and wordy, which the actors and director were up for the challenge. The direction was superb, it was intricate and precise. The actors held together and delivered the script in a phenomenal way, you could tell how well they knew their character and what their intentions were.  This play spoke about complex issues around gender, manipulation and seduction though the lens of Little Ones camp, raunchy, theatrical style. It was extremely entertaining and fun to watch and be apart of. Although it was beautifully designed and performed I did take deep issue with part of the story. There is a part in the play, towards the end, were one of the male characters quite blatantly sexually assaults a woman, who to my understanding is quite young. It is played as comedy and is brushed off quite quickly, which I found very uncomfortable and it a later scene it was suggested that it was consensual, which I just didn’t believe, it seemed to be like coercion, which was deeply upsetting. I’m unsure if little ones was trying to make a statement about sexual assault in some way with this scene, but it did not translate to me at all, if you’re going to take a path of making a stamen about sexual assault through satire, which is a rocky path to begin with, it must be overt, and obvious that you are no condoning the actions of person who committed sexual assault.  I don’t have an answer to what Little Ones were trying to say with this scene, but I must say that it did offend me, and I would like to know the answer. Dangerous Liaisons by Little Ones theatre is showing at Theatre Works until August 20th. Written by Ebony Beaton. Voiced by Adalya Hussein. 

My Scientology Movie sees BBC presenter, Louis Theroux, attempt to infiltrate the Church of Scientology, an organisation infamous for being shrouded in secrecy. Curiosity about the mysterious inner workings of the church, along with reports of assault committed by leader, David Miscavige, motivate Theroux’s efforts to understand life inside the Church and why it is so confidential.  Since first approaching the Church in 2002, Theroux’s pursuit to gain access to the Church and interview Miscavige had been denied. Classified under the spiritual state of Operating Thetan (OT) and one of the highest levels within the hierarchy, members of the “Sea Org” also declined to be involved. Without admittance to the Church or interviews with practising Scientologists, one would assume any plans for the documentary would be abandoned. Instead, Theroux sets out to re-enact incidences involving Miscavige, the Sea Org and high profile member, Tom Cruise by holding a casting call in Hollywood, where the Church’s Los Angeles headquarters resides. Theroux is aided by Mark “Marty” Rathbun, an ex-Scientologist who was previously Miscavige’s second-in-command. The casting call sparks bitter backlash from the Scientologist community, resulting in Theroux and his team being stalked and threatened throughout the film. Casting actors to re-create Marty’s recollections of being a Scientologist works well to gradually introduce the audience to Scientology and awaken Marty’s memories. Most importantly, this approach compels Scientologists to engage with the documentary. Theroux appeals to the quality all scientologists, whether practising or excommunicated, seem to share in the film; an overbearing sense of pride. This could be attributed to the “auditing sessions” all members must undergo, which involve practicing intimidation techniques and dominating your opponent’s mind. Marty helps Theroux conduct a mock auditing session with the cast members to help them understand the harsh treatment within the Church and what motivates their characters. These techniques aim to instil doubt and distrust in the follower, hardening their mind but also weakening their empathy. Marty, despite having left the Church seven years ago, displays a similar type of pride when speaking about his previous role within Scientology, boasting that the “Church was absolutely at [his] beck and call”. Marty is a conflicted character, both reminiscing about former glory and bitter towards his past aggressors. The main criticism against Theroux documentaries is the presenter tends to insert himself into the narrative, steering away from traditional methods of strict observation. Fans of Theroux will relish the moment he catches his interviewees off-guard with his quips and quirky interviewing style, a trademark of his documentaries. Those intrigued by both the subject and the way the presenter engages with the subject will find this film captivating. However, I can appreciate that those who prefer the traditional style would not welcome his techniques, which often blur the line between conventional documentary and reality tv. This is where the genius lies, though, for the cast of actors play two roles in this film; the fabricated re-enactment of Marty’s memories and their real experiences with Scientologists as they’re hounded during filming. The switches between official BBC camera footage and mobile recordings suggests the documentary is largely unfiltered, and reinforces the idea of the film’s authenticity. This balances the growing suspicion you may feel when listening to Marty’s stories, a position I found myself in especially when he omits piece of information or becomes agitated without warning. I would highly recommend going to see this film, whether you’re a Theroux fan or not. It sees the talents of director, John Dower, and producer, Simon Chinn, come together and make a thought-provoking and entertaining film. Written by Erin Connellan

La Mama’s P.O.V. Dave is essentially a film noir play about a retiring press photographer who gets more than he bargained for with his last assignment. It definitely shows that most of playwright/producer Noel Maloney’s background is in screenwriting as he takes on the kind of story and genre that is much more acquainted with the screen than with the stage. Dave’s profession as a merchant of dirty secrets working for his heartless editor, Bronwyn, has finally driven away his beloved wife, Susan (both played brilliantly by Eleanor Howlett) and, now that one of his assignments has driven a young girl to suicide, this job could also destroy his relationship with his son, Jack (the talented young Jude Katsianis) if he should ever find out. He plans to get out after getting one last fat paycheque that will set him up until he finds a more respectable job. He just has to get a few compromising shots of a sleazy priest named Kevin (Gabriel Partingon), although it turns that he and his saccharine wife Kathryn (Annie Lumsden) have been playing this game for some time and have long known how to win. All of this is depicted in a long series of flashbacks that Dave is experiencing in his dying moments on a train. As such, much of the story is told through narration delivered by Dave, who is both our dying man looking back on how he ended up here and our jaded film noir detective whose gloomy inner psyche the piece is delving into. This is what Maloney turns to whenever he wants to write in a Hitchcockian scene that doesn’t translate so well to the stage. Strangely though, it’s also where he puts many moments that probably would have worked more powerfully if they were played out in full. Even though occasionally it offers a special insight into Dave’s thoughts, it’s still a rather clunky storytelling device, as is the overused framing of the wretched man’s life flashing before his eyes as he faces an untimely death. What makes it work much better than it probably should is the inspired performance of Keith Brockett as Dave. Brockett is certainly not the typical film noir anti-hero, and as far as dying wretched men go, he is certainly one of the more interesting and entertaining ones. Brockett has such a powerful stage presence and has so finely perfected his characterisations of short, bumbling, amusing yet complex characters that Dave’s overindulgent amounts of dialogue are still a joy and a fascination to listen to. The same goes for the rest of the cast, who populate this familiar narrative landscape with characters that feel wonderfully fresh and exciting. Dave’s family, including his fading father (Peter Stratford) are the true emotional backbone and moral centre of the story. They definitely feel like a family worth fighting for, and their characterisations are much fuller than those of most of their cinematic counterparts. The seedy editor, Bronwyn, whose scenes are all angry phone conversations with Dave, is the kind of boss character you would only hear and never see if this was a film. However, director Beng Oh more than makes do with having Howlett perform her lines with her back to the audience and a cigarette in her hand. Partington and Lumsden, as the creepy priest and his manipulative wife, are two very striking villains and the perfect foil to the naïve Dave and Susan. The final theatrical touch that enlivens the story and compensates for the clichés is Christina Logan-Bell’s staging and Tom Backhaus’ sound design. Just like the lead performances, the bookending scenes on the train that show Dave’s gruesome death manage are dramatized as an incredibly immersive fusion of the realism of the cinema and the hyperrealism of the theatre, which is what Maloney seems to have been aiming for in his writing. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

There is of course an old adage that comedy equals tragedy, plus time. In the case of Cholai, Arun Roy's black comedy about the Bengali hooch fatalities in 2011, not much time apparently is needed for us to be laughing about the thousands of deaths caused by a bad batch of illegal home liquor. Cholai is the local common name for this strongly addictive, very cheap and very lucrative brew. The Bengali government and law enforcement have been known to turn a blind eye to its distribution, until, as it is told in the film at least, the wife of a manufacturer accidentally tampers with the mixture. She only finds out that the results were toxic after it has sold and consumed across the entire village, killing nearly 200 of its most valued middle-aged male drunks. Roy is supremely cynical in his depiction of this tragedy. The death scenes themselves are presented in a cold yet absurd fashion, one that suggests that the men had it coming, that they deserve their punishment for poisoning their minds and body with illicit substances. Their deaths are dealt with very quickly, as Roy is itching to get to the crux of the story: the fallout. The government is of course pressured for a simple explanation and a quick response. They are lightning-quick to offer compensation for the victims’ families, which they hope will also stop all of the questions. The media, of course, spreads this information as far as it possibly can, along with every juicy, gruesome detail about the crisis that they can get their hands on. Where facts are sparse, they clutch at straws to get something that sounds newsworthy. The movies usually portrays television news in one of two ways: docudrama realism or fanciful parody. Cholai definitely does the latter. It judges the media as cruelly as it lambasts the government, but not without a sense of fun. Much of the film is very episodic and emotionally detached from its own story. After the effects of the chemical blunder have fanned out far beyond the small village where this all started, every second scene seems to be a self-contained vignette that tears a particular aspect of Bengali society. It would have probably been too messy to squash all of Roy’s criticisms into the main story, so this colourful collection of hit-and-miss subplots feels like the best way to get in some extra jabs at the region’s welfare system, health care, economy and even a confusingly patriarchal women’s protest movement. For good measure, Roy also throws in some scenes on a bus route frequented by a handful of amateur social commentators, who all seem to be the director’s mouthpieces as they express their profound disillusionment with the present state of the region. There are a few political subplots in particular that leave a strong impression, in terms of both message and story: those that show the families attempting to exploit the bureaucracy around compensation for their own personal gain, and those that reveal the media’s penchant for milking sympathy for a reformed sinner. However, quite a few of Roy’s statements do get lost in all of the chaos. Without the usual cinematic oxygen of emotional investment, some of the longer vignettes are very quick to run out of fuel. Fortunately, there is a consistent thread in the actions and reactions of the cholai manufacturer, Natah, and his wife, Bishu, who started this entire mess. Funnily enough, the two perpetrators are the characters that come out relatively unscathed by Roy’s fierce social satire. He seems to respect their intelligence more than those of the other characters (which still isn’t saying very much though). As mere inhabitants of this farcically defective society, these two are not painted as shameless opportunists, but more as perceptive people with enough common sense to know that they should take something if it is practically being handed to them by people who can well afford to have it taken from them. Unlike Natah’s honest, hardworking brother, whose decency has never been interesting enough to win him fame and fortune, Natah and Bishu are quick to spot and seize the unscrupulous shortcut to success that is staring them in the face. Cholai has a lot of fun delivering uncomfortable truths such as these. By not asking its audience to really care about the characters it puts forward, it has nothing to lose by being as exaggerated and ridiculous as it wants to be, except perhaps the consistent interest of its audience. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

The first half of the Melbourne International Film Festival has flown by, and I've already seen some great films like Cosmos, Paterson and The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki. Among the films I've seen, though, there's been a fantastic selection of horror films, and I thought I'd spotlight four of them: three narrative features, all by first-time filmmakers, and a documentary. First up, The Eyes of My Mother. An American film, but with occasional Portuguese dialogue, it's one of the first films I got to see and it's still stayed with me. One day, a little girl witnesses some terrible violence in her home; an intruder shows up but is subsequently overpowered, and from that moment that violence seeps through to her brain as she grows up and her life spirals into chilling psychopathic behaviour. Shot in black-and-white, there's a wistful, melancholy, poetic tone enshrouding the on-screen horror. With echoes of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, the film delves into some very dark places, both explicit and not. But despite the disturbing and violent developments the film manages to retain a beautiful, almost meditative atmosphere, and our sympathy for the central character never leaves even though she's doing awful, awful things. I mean, all she wants is a family... in a way... A very promising debut by filmmaker Nicolas Pesce. Maybe hug a loved one after this. Next up, there's Baskin. Another highly disturbing horror film, this time from Turkey, written and directed by Can Evrenol. A group of police officers receive a distress call in a remote building and head over to investigate. Once there they discover some truly hellish stuff. The film's got lots of graphic gore and screaming, with a shudderingly creepy main villain. The visuals are striking and colourful and the score is particularly vivid. Unfortunately, there's not much of anything else. The pacing is uneven and I didn't really find myself being invested in any of the characters, so despite several really interesting and horrifying sequences it all in all made for unengaging viewing. Some great ideas in this, but not entirely well-executed. Moving slightly east again we have Under the Shadow, by Babak Anvari, set in Iran in the 1980s, after the Iranian revolution and during the Iran-Iraq conflicts. It centres on a woman and her husband and young daughter living in an apartment block in Tehran. Not only is there the constant threat of missile attacks but some strange, nightmarish things start to occur, and when the father is called away to military service the mother and daughter are left to deal with the supernatural dread that plagues them. Under the Shadow does a fantastic job of channeling serious political and parental fears into a deliciously slow-burning terror, the tension building and building, holding you captive until it explodes in the final ten to fifteen minutes, unleashing full-scale horror. All throughout it stays gripping, then right at the end it starts ripping. Excellently shot with some unsettling camera movements and production design that captures the period as well as the evil closing in. Probably my favourite of the three. Finally, I saw Fear Itself, a documentary on horror films written and directed by Charlie Lyne. Or rather, it's not so much a documentary as a cine-essay, a stream of thoughts on horror films and the way that they relate to real human fears and anxieties. Impressive in scope and mesmerising in equal measure, the film itself is essentially a collage, in that it consists entirely of edited-together footage from existing horror films, and hypnotic narration over the top that takes you on an engrossing journey through humanity's darkness. The range of films chosen is admirable, encompassing a vast range of horror cinema from across the world and throughout history, even using some films that aren't traditionally considered horror films but which have certain elements that illustrate the points that the filmmaker is trying to make about horror films, which in turn ties back to the points he makes about humanity. And the exploration of the themes is engrossing, thoughtful and at times quite personal. It's transfixing and thought-provoking and highly recommended not just for horror fans but for anyone interested in the depths of the human soul. And that's all the horror films at the festival that I've been able to see so far, but there's more to come! A few I'm looking forward to are Killing Ground and The Devil's Candy, both by Australian directors, as well as The Lure and The Love Witch, which from what I've heard are very very weird, and I can't wait. There's still another week left of the festival, so get out there and start shitting your pants in terror. I'll be in the cinema with you, toilet paper in hand. Till next time, see you there... Written by Ben Volchok

234 years after Pierre Choderlos de Laclos's novel Les liaisons dangereuses was published, and 31 years after the premier production of its stage adaptation by Christopher Hampton, this new production from Little Ones Theatre comes to Melbourne as a fresh and lively piece of contemporary theatre. Those who've studied the novel will certainly appreciate how director Stephen Nicolazzo has captured the sardonic spirit of the French aristocracy, while newcomers will surely be enticed into discovering more about it all. Most importantly though, this sojourn amongst the affairs of the French court has a meanly entertaining story to tell and the courage to tell it like it was. It was a world where wit and amoral intellect was the currency of the day, ruled by those whose minds were as nimble as their bodies and even more adept at vigorous intercourse, but whose hearts were held in as tightly as their bladders. Amazingly, Nicolazzo, and indeed his nearly all-female cast, are daring enough to match the intensity of the vocal sparring with raunchy nude scenes of masochistic intimacy, sights that are capable of shocking today's audiences as much as the sounds of blasphemy would have shocked 18th century audiences. He introduces his audience to this arena with an onslaught of ridiculous wigs, pasty white faces, exaggerated mannerisms, opulent set design from Eugyeene Teh and a robot-like match of Four in a Row. Here the original Connect Four is spruced up with some video game sound effects, just as the rest of the play is peppered with interludes of modern pop music. While it's certainly been done before, and not always well, the songs are well chosen to illustrate a battle between the two finest players in the great game of courtship. Representing men, we have the seductive Vicomte de Valmont (Zoe Boesen), and on the side of women we have the decadent Marquise Isabelle de Merteuil (Alexandra Uldrich). The two of them look to be evenly matched in cunning, arrogance and education. They court each other for pride and amusement, just as they carry on affairs with countless others as a form of recreation and competition. Their relationship is the classic on-and-off mix of love and hate, of devotion and indifference. Both actors are outstanding as these familiar archetypes that, through the immediacy of live theatre, are given new life. Boesen is as convincing as she needs to be in the part of a man. It turns out to be quite an inspired casting choice, seeing as many of the characteristics that are now considered feminine would have been regarded as masculine in the French salons. On the other hand, the Vicomte's valet, Azolan, is played by Tom Dent, who towers over Boesen as something of a gentle giant at first, before the Vicomte comes to realise how much he underestimated him. As the Marquise, Aldrich somehow manages to switch between, comical, despicable, likeable and moving with the speed of a lighting change. Her endlessly expressive face, richly intoned voice and slick movements make her a consistently fascinating character to watch, even when the main scene is happening elsewhere. The Vicomte's latest challenge, to court the devoutly Catholic and chronically morose Cécile de Volanges (Brigid Gallacher), forms the crux of a narrative that exposes the naiveties of both characters. The Vicomte believes that his heart can be contained again after it has been let loose, that you can control love and prevent love from controlling you. A parodic performance of Felix Jaehn's 'Ain't Nobody (Loves me better)' succinctly captures the Vicomte's delusions about these two of the many women in his life. While his twisted love for the Marquise is sold successfully by Hampton's writing and by Aldrich and Boesen's peformances, the love he eventually comes to feel for Cécile is not given enough time or breathing space to feel real, and certainly not enough to surmount the trite baggage that this plot line has garnered over the centuries. Fortunately, the Marquise's hard-learned lesson that emotions cannot always be suppressed for the sake of the game is a much more convincing character arc. A playful karaoke of Whitney Houston's 'I'm Every Woman' is similarly effective at signaling the universality of the Marquise's doomed attempt to fight with, and not against, the sexism of her world, to win at a game that has always been rigged against her gender instead of seeking to change the rules. The only music that doesn't quite fit is the funk tune that plays over a certain duel scene, one that felt like it was meant to be the climax, but ended up being a slow build-up to a fierce contest that never eventuates. One of the most common problems with many tragicomedies, is that they often make promises they can't keep. However, thanks to the talent of the creative team, and the strong establishment of its setting and main characters, Dangerous Liaisons delivers on most of the comedic payoffs it spends time developing in its first act, and remembers to set up most of the dramatic payoffs it launches itself into during the second act. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

Not-so-Raging Bull, Juho Kuosmanen's boxing biopic pulls the gentlest punches it can in telling the story of amateur boxer Olli Mäki, hailing from a small town in Finland and aspiring to not much more. It's warm and personable, and its deliberate type of simplicity is one that more filmmakers should aim for. Affectionately put together, the film has a fantastic grainy black-and-white 16mm aesthetic that perfectly matches its subject. You're immediately drawn into its world when the lovely title music kicks in but, cleverly, that is just about the only non-diegetic use of music in the film. Script, camera, style, editing and mood carry the film on their own. The narrative focus is always on Olli, and the boxing is always a background, echoing the way he feels about his chosen sport; his heart is never truly in his training until the motivation comes from Raija (the woman he falls in love with). He never wants to be a professional - even his fighting nickname is quite plain: "The Baker of Kokkola". He's in love and that's all he needs. In English, the title is The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki, and it's signalled fairly early on that this his happiness stems not from his future boxing match but from love; the title is introduced, after all, when Olli and Raija are on their way to a wedding. But in Finnish, the title is noticeably shorter, and indeed on further investigation, I found out that its Finnish title - Hymyilevä Mies - translates quite simply to "Smiling Man". Bless. Olli Mäki is less of an underdog and more of an underachiever. And this film about his happiest day is an unexpected delight. Truly a nice and nicely-made film. Written by Ben Volchok

First-time filmmakers seem to either stumble on their feet or find those feet immediately and use them to run away with a superb debut. Such is the case with Bi Gan, a poet-turned-director whose Kaili Blues is a simply staggering first feature. The plot - in short, an uncle searching for a nephew - is central to the understanding of the film and yet absolutely irrelevant. It's a tale of repentance and guilt, of soul-searching and memory... all themes explored through the plot, for sure, but it's the mood and the technical audacity that drive this one home. Poetic and hypnotic, the power of this film comes from its deceptive simplicity; it washes over you so easily that its depth and the contents themselves can too easily fall by the wayside. The whole film is a sort of daze and watching it in the uncertain hours of the night I wasn’t sure if I didn't dream it all. But to simply call it a dream would be to discredit the details and quirks - and the effort - of all those involved in putting this together. No review of this film would be complete without mentioning the 40-odd-minute take, crafted beautifully in such a way that it's barely noticeable and yet right there staring you in the face the whole time. The camerawork in general is to be commended (by Tianxing Wang, another first-timer) but reaches a whole other level in this sequence. There's moments of stillness, moments of movement; one notable movement is when the camera takes a "shortcut" through some buildings as the scooter it had previously been following rides around and catches up with the camera a few seconds later. I don't think I've caught up with it, though. This will definitely need some further processing. Really highly recommended. Written by Ben Volchok

When I read the book [Witold Gombrowicz’s Cosmos] in preparation for watching the film I was struck by the singular oddness of the writing (albeit a translation) both in style and in content. There were moments when the sheer incessancy of the intricate madness lost me but I battled through and ended up being wholly won over. Three things in particular struck me: the emphasis on the mundane, the staunch surrealism and the never-quite-referencing of the encompassing void of the eponymous cosmos. It’s vivid and evocative in its deliberately obfuscatory pseudo-dullness - and knowing it was adapted by Andrzej Žuławski, the master of surreal existential mania, made me even more curious to see how it would be turned into a film. Safe to say my trust in Žuławski’s mastery - based, I must admit, on only two films as of yet (Possession (1981) and TheDevil (1972)) - was fully validated. It fulfils the major criteria of successful adaptations - that is, hitting most of the same beats and details of the source and capturing its spiritual essence - and then adds its own specific touches. And what a source! And what touches! The film most definitely channels the mundane mania (or… mundania?) of the book but also tops it off with incredible incredulities of its own. All the dead animals are there, the perverse language play is there (made all the more impressive for being translated from Polish to French as well as English in the subtitles), the unrepressable emotional tension, the focus on hands, the frightening absurdity… but there’s also extra discussions of film and literature (including a cheeky self-deprecating namedrop of one of Žuławski’s own films) and the dives into the writing process, as well as a wicked satisfyingly unsatisfying ending. Žuławski’s Cosmos (without forgetting Gombrowicz’s book - he named the main character after himself, by the way) speaks to my adoration and desire of the profoundly inconsequential, the horror of everyday surrealism, the incomprehensible chaos of minutiae… our mouths are a dark cavern and so is space, we are told. Am I totally out of it or is that a huge insignificant revelation of stupid genius? Hours after seeing this at the cinema my head was still spinning. Spinning, spinning, spinning. Spinning with the ridiculous, glorious intensity of life’s tedium and the tedium of life’s ridiculous, glorious intensity. Spinning with how much we know and how little we understand. Spinning with the unnecessariness and the importance of existence. It makes at once perfect sense and no sense at all. The contradictions here are on purpose. I mean, the cosmos is everything, and the cosmos is nothing. And we are all the cosmos… Written by Ben Volchok

Jerzy Skolimowski's career is defined by a healthy disregard for conventional filmmaking. He has always been a punk of the highest order. And it's with total delight that I report that this pedigree is on full display in 11 Minutes. From the beginning, we know we are in the hands of an unhinged master. The menacing pre-titles scrapbook of low-res footage from laptop, phone and security cameras clearly signals his anarchic intent. And it also signals the genre we are being propelled into: the multi-character storyline. Essentially, the film is just that: a glimpse into the lives of several characters over the eleven minutes of the film's title past 5 o'clock, some of which intersect over the course of the narrative and all of which intersect at the end. The short time span means we never get a full impression of who these characters are, but we accept that we were never really meant to. Plus there's more than enough in there to give a rough sense of who they are, and it's surprising how much can actually happen in eleven minutes. Crammed with pounding music and brazen, in-your-face camerawork, the freewheeling style of this film has annoyed and frustrated many of my fellow cinemagoers, to say the least. And it's not hard to see why; Skolimowski almost tries deliberately to throw us off at every step, like a bucking bronco with an ongoing glitch. But it's worth persevering and holding on. Because the reward you get is the utter juggernaut of an ending that's been lying in wait the whole time. The ending, like every one of Skolimowski's endings that I've seen so far, is a shocking slap to the face. It’s the culmination of all of the events that take place in the film, the swirling final movement of the strangely melodic cacophony. For the whole film we have been riding on rollercoasters whose screws have been steadily rattling, until they bring us crashing off the rails right at the end of the track. And then the final breathtaking zoom out, telling us that this was only eleven minutes in the lives of only a handful of characters: look at how much else could be and has been going on. Cue open eyes, open mouths and stopping heart. Holy crap. Proof that you don't have to get soft when you get old, 11 Minutes is another notch firmly whammed into the belt of a continually unrepentant filmmaker. Just wow. Written by Ben Volchok

Red Stitch continues their environmentalist theme for the season in Extinction, written by the powerhouse creative talent Hannie Rayson and directed by the critically acclaimed Nadia Tass. On the International Union for Conservation of Nature and natural resources red list (IUCN), Australia is classed as having 35 of its discovered species extinct. The fraught task of resolving this issue, beneath the ever present spectre of national and international environmental strife, is the primary concern of the performance. Harry Jewel, played by Colin Lane, is a mining magnate turned mild environmental altruist after hitting and killing an endangered quoll in his four wheel drive. He is the political foil for Andy Dixon-Brown, played by Brett Cousins, a practical yet idealistic man and practising veterinarian who holds the natural world sacrosanct, and is suffering from a terminal illness akin to Parkinson's. Dix, played by Natasha Herbert, is the director of the CAPE institute and Andy's 50 year old sister. She leans pragmatically towards Harry Jewell's camp, and is passionate about establishing an objective, statistics based approach to the rescue of endangered species - essentially, that if the species numbers drop below 5000, then they're not worth the expense, financially and to the detriment of other species who might still have a chance.  Piper, played by Ngaire Dawn Fair, a  conservation biologist, is her opposite number, the sexy young idealist, who firmly and energetically believes everything can be saved, from her cancerous 12 year old dog Beast to the terminally endangered tiger quoll. Whether or not the fact of Australian eco-apocalypse is high on your list of immediate concerns, this play is going to put your value system under pressure. In the hour and a half, you will be forced to take a stance somewhere on the slippery, uneven ground of environmental politics, and the moral nuances of the current Australian environmental crisis. The cast tackle many obstacles in their struggle to come to terms with how best to address the situation of a changing country, a changing world, which seems to be gathering momentum on its plummet toward an environmental apocalypse. Yet this is play is flawed. I do not believe that it conquered the classic perils of the polemic political play, awkwardly failing to be compelling, engaging and subtle as it is so keenly self aware of its own highly political agenda. It felt as if the dramatic relationships between the four characters had been loosely cobbled together to forge a thin veil for what is really just a tedious outlining of all the different arguments currently dominating the environmental debate.  The characters attempted to convince us of their humanity - mainly via loose plotlines focusing on the shifting sexual (read 'human') dynamics between the group - before switching comfortably back into parroting some lukewarm political sentiments that, delivered with no lack of passion or pathos from the actors. For me, this marriage of the general arguments surrounding the issue of environmentalism and the earnest, chest-beating noble-oratory aphoristic style of the dialogue did not make compelling theatre. Which is unfortunate, as the cast is not short of talent. Colin Lane showed some classic comedic timing, of which there really should have been more - there are plenty of jokes scattered around the play, and some good, funny, horribly awkward situations. Although the humour of the play is poorly executed, but it is still there, and I could appreciate what was trying to be achieved. However for some reason there seems to be a total lack of chemistry between them - the relationships that are put at stake in the performance never matter to the audience, because they are never made to matter. Their ostensibly significant motivations of family or love are just thrown in by name and barebones behavioural reference, without ever proving to the audience that these relationships are valuable. Furthermore, the set is fraught with a multimedia program that starts as an interesting novelty and is halfway abandoned by the mid section, that became more distraction than enhancement. I was disappointed, as the beginning of the play uses music, sound effects and film in a way I found highly moving - the script says it all: 'Introduce the sound of the quoll’s heartbeat softly. This underscores the action to the end of the scene'. There was a profound silence in the audience as the heartbeat that had been present for the last ten minutes, the heartbeat we had all wanted to continue, halted as the lethal injection was given to the badly wounded quoll. The final scene of the play, where Piper finally confronts Andy, I found a confusing mess, both in clichéd language and melodramatic behaviour, to a degree worthy of The Bold and the Beautiful, not helped by a soppy pop-score playing over the projection of a quoll scurrying around in the bush, thus restoring balance and hope to the universe. This play attempts to do so much and in my opinion, therein lies it's problem. There is no steady theme, there is no likeable character. Everyone is flawed and nobody is redeemed. The penultimate scene of the play had audience members around me sighing, or even laughing, at a scene not meant to be funny, it was so unconvincing. And frankly, I don't know exactly where to lay the blame, where everything went so wrong. Was it the writer delivering clichéd dialogue, normative, predictable plotlines and a thematic fiasco? Did the director micromanage the actors into robots? Have the actors failed the script? Either way - decide for yourself.  Extinction is showing at the Arts Centre every day until the 13th of August. Head over to artscentremelbourne.com.au for more information and bookings. Written by Jim Thomas

Jump First, Ask Later is an urban choreographic portrait of the streets of Fairfield in Western Sydney, the most culturally diverse region Australia. The show features 5 young street dancers moving between their stories and dance sequences. Right from the beginning their physical strength and agility is striking and compelling to watch. The opening sequence is a warm up, but unlike any I’ve every seen – it becomes immediately clear that these are very physically strong and talented performers. The audience was a mix of adults and children and you could see right from the beginning that everyone was amazed by the sheer psychical ability of the performers. After the warm up, the show settles into its narrative, which is told through casual ‘street’ like conversations between the performers and is based off their real experiences. While I assume the performers don’t have much acting experience (the conversational moments at times feel a little wooden), they are fundamentally likable  stage characters and the conversations have a raw charm. All the performers are from immigrant backgrounds, and we learn in snapshots the struggles their parents had in coming the Australia, and the subsequent struggles these 5 performers had finding their place within Australia.  The narrative portrays parkour as a kind of saviour for these young dancers, providing them each with community, purpose, and joy. While the stories are interesting, they pail in comparison to the dance segments themselves. I’m not sure whether I wanted more from the narrative, or whether the dance segments were so fantastic that the conversational moments just couldn’t speak with the same beauty. The stage came alive with movement and backflips, beautiful synchronised moments and jaw dropping asks of physical strength and agility. There was a wonderful sense of fluidity, light and shade in the movement – at times the stage was bursting with colour, only to then be parred back to much quieter moments. Jump First, Ask Later was wonderful – both in it’s artful weaving of narrative and dance, and in the sheer joy the performers got out of their practice, and we the audience got out it in turn. Although performances at the Arts Centre Melbourne have concluded, Force Majeure will be bringing their production to the Sydney Opera House. Information can be found at their website. Written by Beth Gibson.

There will be some mildly sexual language and content throughout this review. If that might be a problem for you, tune out for the next five minutes or so - but, you'll be missing the breakdown of a great show. A live band of sorts, and performance goes with the music Duets is a show that will probably take you out of your theatre-comfort zone, unless you usually attend shows that include women performing suggestive acts with a banana and a tomato, or men in sequined morph suits gyrating to music, wearing enormous strap on dildo's. It is the second in a series of productions by performance troupe The Stain. Jo Franklin, in an interview with La Mama, suggested that the Stain's full title and job description should be 'performance art live music ensemble'. Duets is directed by Maude Davey, and the brainchild of the Stain core group Francesca Sculli, Jo Franklin and Gen Berstein. They are accompanied in the show by Harpist Genevive Fry, performance artists Sarah Ward, The Huxley' and Paula Russel. This is complimented with a haunting soundscape from Nat Grant, lighting design by Simon Coleman and set construction and props by Herbz. The bio for the performance reads that it is set in 'an underground world marred by the spoils of life'. The set reminded me of the party Neo attends in the first Matrix movie, as he follows the figurative white rabbit. Dark, smoky, sweaty, and indeed, this world the Stain are about to take us into with Duet's is very alike to falling into a bizarre wonderland. Plastic sheets, the kind Bateman lines his apartment with in the famous American Pyscho  murder scene, canvas the walls of the small theatre. The chairs for the audience are essentially a part of the stage. The drum kit and mics are so close to the front row that there is a very vague distinction between audience member and performer, especially when the performers make a point of roaming behind and into the audience at times, demanding your attention. There is a fantastic light show, and the dancing lasers scramble your conception of any stability or normality in the universe of the show. Francesca and Joe, the key performers and singers, do not merely sing, standing still behind a mike, but gyrate, stare, gesture. There is a comedy to their performance, but also a deep seriousness, and the atmosphere is thick with an almost undetectable tension - I found myself deeply immersed in their world, the world of the steamy club party and exploration of sexuality, interrogating aspects of it constantly. It is very clear that you are being taken out of your world and plonked down into a place which remembers and mimics things that are present in our own - love, sex, television, pop music, dance - but is not really them, rather, it is a place that subverts them, makes them ugly, beautiful, sad, silly, elegant or deranged, most obvious in their many adaptations of popular songs, warping and moulding music from artists such as Gotye and Rihanna.  It is over the top, confronting, but given that life can so frequently be overwhelming and bizarre in all its aspects, I believe Duets captures and champions this fact. The show bears watching a second time - I do not think I gleaned too much of their message from the first viewing, perhaps so overwhelmed and engaged with the theatre of it all, and the sheer fun of listening to good, interesting live music. What I do know is that Duets is trying, both lightly and desperately, to examine the intensity of a human connection. And, while I believe they examine this most overtly through a sexual connection, this I can believe is also highly symbolic of other modes of desire, and the accompanying human flaws and compromises that can ruin any fantasy. The element that moved me the most was Paula Russel's dancing. She dressed in a white flowing garment, and danced wildly around with a silly glint in her eye, beckoning us through the door and to our seats for the evening. She served as a kind of glorified roadie, changing over instruments and clearing the stage in a hyper energetic, twirling fury. In the dying moments of the play, she appeared on stage, after all the other performers and musicians had vacated it. I only expected her to do something silly, light, comedic, to see us off for the evening. I was so presently surprised when she presented us with a full ten minute, highly choreographed dance, that was elegant, fractured, quietly sad but also defiantly optimistic It's importance was accentuated given her capacity in the performance leading up to this point had been secondary, a relief character of sorts - a character that had been there from before we had even sat down, a person we had taken for granted and assumed to be unimportant. It was wonderful to have these expectations subverted, in that she proved to be one of the most compelling aspects of the performance, in my mind. Catch Duet's at La Mama theatre, where it is showign until the 14th of August. Bookings and more info at lamama.com.au. Written by Jim Thomas

Mill on the Floss is a theatrical adaptation by Optic Nerve of the 1860 novel of the same name written by Mary Ann Evans under the pseudonym George Eliot. Optic Nerves adaption of Mill on the Floss was a theatrical re-telling of the story of Maggie Tulliver. This adaption is much the same as the book, it is set in 19th century England, and it spans across 10-15 years of Maggies life starting when Maggie was 9 years old. This story is about the oppression of Maggies imagination, intelligence and agency as a woman living in a small town. It is very clear to the audience from the beginning and Maggie is a very smart woman, she loves to read and learn, but it is quickly stifled by her father, telling her she shouldn’t be reading books. Maggie is left to her own imagination while her brother, unwillingly goes to school, something that Maggie dreams of doing. Later we see a teenage Maggie, and then an older Maggie, perhaps in her early 20s. All throughout the play we see Maggie struggling to find her independence in a world that is unwilling to accommodate her. It is very clear that if it weren’t for the oppressive society that she lives in she would excel in academia and very easily find the independence she had been trying to find all her life, this is contrasted with the story of her brother, who does not wish to go to school and be in command of the family and his own life, essentially is forced into this role in which he is inept and violent.  Optic Nerves adaption of this play is set in the same period as the book in England. The audience surrounds the action of the play in a U-shape. The set and costume design is minimal, with a long raised stage at the back of the space, with few set and props used through the play, like tables and chairs and lots and lots of books. The costumes for men were all the same, a light cream shirt and pants, and for women light cream singlet and skirt.  I had a lot of issues with this adaption. Mainly I fail to understand why it has been set in 19th century England. I felt disconnected by the time period and place it was set, I think this play would have had a much more profound impact on me if it had have been adapted to modern Australia. I connected with Maggies struggle as a woman trying to prove her self in a society that disregards her for her gender, that still resonates today, but I struggled to make any deep connection, this may be because I am not a fan of period drama and putting on accents, but I think placing this piece in modern Australia would have made it a lot more potent because we as the audience would have a clearer look at how these themes still resonate are in modern Australia. There was one point in the play where it seemed to jump forward in time, Maggie was going to a town dance, and the music was like that in a club, I would have enjoyed this element if it was sprinkled all through the play, but the jump to modernity only happened in this one moment which was very jarring and confusing to what was the significance of this, why was the dance modern? I don’t know. I also struggled with the length of this piece. It was over 2 hours long with no interval, and very little changed in set, mood and energy, which was very exhausting, especially because I hadn’t eaten dinner. For a lot of the time the audience was at least partially lit, which made me feel tense and like I couldn’t move, and I am a very fidgety person so this was a struggle for me. The piece was extremely text heavy, and hardly shifted in tone and energy the whole way through, and the acting seemed strained and forced, partially because the accents were so think and loud and strong. The dialogue seemed never ending and I felt like there was no room for me to breathe as an audience member because the content just keep coming and coming and a steady pace, I wanted moments of calm and moments of climax which I only seldom and briefly got, there was only one point of climax which was towards the very end when, seemingly out of no where there was a flood, which in terms of plot confused me, was I meant to know this area of England was prone to flooding? What happened to Maggie and the rest of her family and friends after the flood? I’m not sure, and honestly I didn’t make that much of a connection with any of the characters to have an investment in their fate. Although I could see what the play was trying to do, I feel like it could have achieved more by setting it the 2000s, dropping a lot of the dialogue and cutting the length of the play – this would have also made the play a lot more accessible for those in the audience who at not as knowledgeable about the themes explored in the piece. I feel like this play was made and directed intellectually and not emotionally, and its so important to strike the right balance, otherwise you may be alienating some of your audience members, partially on the topic of feminism and oppression. Mill of the Floss by Optic Nerve is being performed until August 13th at Theatre Works in St Kilda. Written by Ebony Beaton

For any fans of the fantasy genre, Bhaskar Hazarika's Kothanodi is a great entry point into this year’s Indian Film Festival. For anyone's who's not as keen on swords, dragons and castles, this adaptation of four classic Assamese folk tales is not that kind of fantasy movie. Taken from a compendium entitled Burhi Aair Sadhu (Grandma’s Tales) compiled by Lakshminath Bezbaroa, the stories all have a maternal relationship at their centre and a different harsh truth to deliver about motherhood. The story of Malati, and her husband Poonai, is perhaps the harshest of all. They are a childless couple, but only because Poonai's mystical uncle has told his nephew to kill each of the three babies that Malati has given birth to. Poonai promised his father on his deathbed that he would always follow his uncle's counsel, however difficult it might be. The film's opening scene shows Poonai taking their third screaming infant into the dark forest and burying it alive. It's an unexpectedly horrifying introduction to the world of this film, but one that sets the tone right from the outset. The murder is depicted in a way that is dark and confounding, but not gruesome or gratuitous. It operates within the familiar frame of folk tale logic, and in a very recognisable fantasy setting. While Poonai and Malati are naturally disheartened by what they've had to sacrifice, they are not as traumatised as they would be if this film was striving for realism. Nevertheless, the once again pregnant Malati is determined to keep this next child, no matter what Poonai's uncle says. However, her feeling changes when he eventually shows her a vision of what would have happened if she'd kept her other children.  While the rest of the stories don't start off quite as gruesomely, one way or another they all end up in quite a violent place. The tale of Keteki, a woman who has given birth to a fruit, begins less shockingly but just as strangely. A friendly traveller named Devinath tells her that there is in fact a human son inside the fruit, one who loves his mum as much as any child does but who doesn’t fee safe enough to come out of his shell and into the world. As you can imagine, Keteki is simultaneously overjoyed at this discovery and overcome with maternal guilt. The image of her walking around with her elephant apple rolling behind her is so unashamedly bizarre and eventually so emotionally charged that it works. No doubt much of this production’s local audience would have grown up with these stories and have no impulse to question their believability. As for international audiences such as Australia, surely they will respect a film that feels no need to explain itself too much.  The stories are told with an effective mix of fantasy and magical realism. When Devinath guides Keteki through a ritual that will draw out her son, she certainly reacts as though she is watching something otherworldly. It is definitely the film's most fantastical scene, and yet we still feel that we are in the same "real" world where more mundane happenings are taking place. Keteki’s neighbours react to her fruit child with surprise, but not disbelief. They think she is a witch, and a dangerous one. If it’s her they’re afraid of, they should really meet the other two mothers we see here. While Malati and Keteki are the two understatedly sympahetic characters, the domineering Doneshwari and evil stepmother Senehi are our gloriously fearsome villains. Doneshwari, we hear, has been tricked by a cunning python into selling her daughter's hand in marriage.  He managed to conceal his species from Doneshwari until just after the deal was made, but she is not at all aggrieved. She has heard tell of a girl in a nearby village who was also married off to a python. Apparently the morning after the marriage was consummated she woke up dressed in finery and covered with money, so Doneshwari is convinced that her daughter’s marriage will be a very prosperous union. The snake's con happens offscreen, as Hazarika, who wrote and directed the film, very wisely doesn't go so far as showing us a talking snake. The fact that we only ever see him doing things that a real python would do makes Doneshwari appear all the more deluded and self-centred. That said, the avaricious matriarch has nothing on our evil stepmother, Senehi, who also happens to be Devinath's second wife. She is bitterly envious of the special connection between her new husband and his sweet young daughter. She feels incapable of competing with such a strong familial bond, and decides she wants her stepdaughter gone. The final straw is when the girl borrows , without permission, the dress that used to owned by Senehi's deceased mother. While Devinath is off travelling and helping Keteki connect with her withdrawn child, he has unknowingly left his own child at the mercy of a woman who has resolved to kill her. The film's title roughly translates to "dark waters" in English. On its surface, Kothanodi simply looks like a dark but entertaining mix of traditional fables. While it does conjure a sense of curiosity about what fates these characters will eventually meet, they are all quite clearly illustrations of different vices and virtues. However, Hazarika manages to infuse most of these cautionary tales with a contemporary relevance. The story of a woman who must decide whether or not to keep her child, and who is sick of having men make that decision for her, is anything but otherworldly. There are also many children who are born living in their own little world that they never want to leave, something their mothers sadly can't help but take personally. Unfortunately, there are also still many matchmaking mothers around the world who will turn a blind eye to an abusive son-in-law if he is rich enough.  The odd one out here is the wicked stepmother, who just doesn't have the same social resonance as the other three. As memorable as she is, and even though the real world does actually have a few resentful step-parents, hers is a story that feels overrepresented, especially in folk tales. Nevertheless, she is a delightful addition to what is still a deep and varied exploration of what it means to be a mother, and how hard it is to be a good one. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

To say that The New Girl in Class is the weakest offering of the Indian Film Festival would be something of an understatement. Amrita Dasgupta's documentary on the life of a 9-year-old autistic girl is certainly never boring, but for all of the wrong reasons. The story that Dasgupta wants to tell and the story that she has actually documented are so embarrassingly different that the end result approaches the so-bad-it's-good territory. It is so perfect a manual on how not to represent autism that it is, in its own way, highly informative. Roshni is the new girl in question. Her mother, Neeraja, has fought hard to finally get her daughter into a mainstream school. However, she doesn't just want her daughter to get the same opportunities as her non-autistic classmates: she wants her to become them. She wants Roshni to stop flapping her hands, cycling through repetitive actions, and playing with her own saliva (although that last one is certainly justified). She wants her to play ball sports, to play with her toys “appropriately,” just like the other children do. She describes the feeling of grief that she and unfortunately many other parents feel upon receiving an autism diagnosis for their child. Her husband, Shubhashish, talks about it being one of those things that you know happens to other families but never think will happen to yours, about wondering why it had to happen to his family. Listening to them both, you'd think that Roshni had been diagnosed with a terminal illness. Shubhashish says that it gets easier, that the reality eventually sinks in. Neeraja says that she has accepted that autism will be with her daughter for life, that Roshni is not and never will be a typical child, and yet she is trying to make her as close to one as she can. She talks about wanting her daughter to become independent and socially connected, and yet there is never a moment at home, or even at school, where Roshni doesn't have her mother with her. When Roshni isn't at home or at school, she is attending Applied Behavioural Analysis therapy sessions that are designed to make her act like a non-autistic child, whatever the cost. Of course, it's easy to see where Roshni's parents are coming from. They want their daughter to be happy, healthy and successful, and autism, like many things, is excluded from the mainstream picture of happiness, health and success. Neeraja rejoiced when Roshni was walking and talking sooner than the other children, but panics as soon as her little girl starts falling behind in the race. Autism might now be widely known, but it is still sparsely understood. It is something that Neeraja had probably heard about but never given a second thought until Roshni was diagnosed. Now she is desperately playing catch-up. She is trying do the right thing. She is researching like crazy, but the immense ocean of literature out there is overwhelming, even to those who’ve been learning about it all their life, simply because just about everyone seems to have something to say about autism. For Neeraja, what floats to the surface is what speaks to what she has already been taught to want for her child: for her to be normal, but not average; special, but not "special". Autism research and services is a huge, lucrative business. There is naturally a lot of money to be made in telling parents that their neurodiverse child is broken, and that you know how to fix them. Similarly, there is much acclaim to be won from making a documentary about a heroic mother on a quest to rescue her child from the disability of the week. What is much harder to sell is acceptance, accessibility, and social and systemic change brought about by some long, hard self-reflection. We do hear at least one person politely challenge Neeraja’s quest. In the closest thing this film has to a climax, where Neeraja finds out if her daughter has passed her first year at her new school, Roshni’s wise school principal reminds her that every child learns at their own pace and in their own way. Sadly though, her tiny bit of screen time is too little, too late. We see interviews conducted with Roshni’s beleaguered parents, her strict therapists, her bewildered classmates, and even her twin sister, Srishti, who knows about Roshni’s diagnosis, but not one of them is taken with Roshni herself. This means that countless important questions are never answered, or even addressed. What does Roshni want? What are her interests? What does she enjoy doing? What does she think of her classmates? What does she think of her new school? How does she feel about having her mum at school with her all day, every day? If her sister knows about her diagnosis, does Roshni also know? Did she overhear it? Did she figure it out? How does she feel about it? Why is it hard for her to focus on playing a ball game? Is it really because she has a short attention span, as her father thinks, or does she just not like playing ball sports? Why does she like playing with her toys differently? What stories is she creating in her head? Why does she sometimes lash out at people? Is it because she feels overwhelmed? Frustrated? Threatened? Scared? Does she know that Srishti discloses her diagnosis and life story to anyone who asks about her? Does she mind her doing that? Is Srishti accurate in her accounts of her sister’s experiences and feelings? Are her parents’ accounts accurate? As both a biography of Roshni and a documentary on autism, The New Girl in Class really shoots itself in the foot, not just by jumping the gun with its production and restricting itself to the first 9 years of her life, but also, more significantly, by not giving Roshni or any other autistic person the space to be heard. Roshni is made the object, not the subject, of what is supposed to be her own documentary. Instead of hearing from actually autistic people about the realities of being on the spectrum, we are stuck listening to closed-minded non-autistic people making uneducated guesses and getting just about everything wrong. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas

Milk Bars in an installation and performance piece, it is based at The Mechanics Institute in Brunswick by Metanoia Theatre. The installation spread all across the Mechanics Institute, with five spaces and the theatre space being used as a central meeting point and bar that most audience members gravitated towards.  The installation ranged from abstract to realistic interpretations of ‘a milk bar’ some were very interesting and beautiful, my favorite was the dressing room of the theatre that had been turned into a realistic home, perhaps out the back of a milk bar. Some of the installations seemed under done, one of the rooms had pixilated images of old fashions shelves like you’d see in a milkbar, and advertisements playing on another projector, the space was very white and felt unwelcoming, I did not like going into that space. Throughout the space and all at different times were short performances by a handful of different actors, musicians and performance makers, and also the Executive Director of the Convenience and Mixed Business Association. The Performance styles were diverse, but I did not find this to be a a good thing, they ranged from avant garde movement pieces to monologues and story telling delivered to the audience, I found the performances to be inconsistent and jarring moving from one to the other. One of the more confusing performances was Domenic Greco the Executive Director of the Convenience and Mixed Business Association giving a monologue about his childhood growing with his parents owning a milk bar and all the benefits this had to him and his towns community. Parts of his speech were very sweet, but some of it made me feel alienated and offended, he heavily critiqued modern society and the ‘rise of the supermarket’ and how its contributed to a lack of community which to me seemed a bit bias, and he didn’t touch on how supermarkets can be a positive influence, and how with negatives come positives, like the convenience of being able to buy all your goods in one place and employment. I was unsure what he was trying to get across to the audience, perhaps his speech was aimed at people who grew up and rasied their families when milk bars were still around and the main place people went for their goods. The audience could move around the space as they wish but there was little indication of how the night would play out which left me feeling lost and confused and at times lonely because it was unclear what I was meant to be doing, and the program shed no light on it either. Perhaps a few more performers acting as ushers to guild audience members around the space would have been helpful, this would also have helped activate the space because at times it felt static and awkward. Milk Bars would have benefited from a larger ensemble of performers with a consistent performing style; this would have made the space feel more friendly, welcoming and joyous. Milk Bars by Metanoia is showing at The Mechanics Institute in Brunswick until August 6th. Written by Ebony Beaton

Guernica is a two-act ballet inspired by Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, set against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War in the nineteen-thirties. The Melbourne Ballet Company’s resident choreographer Simon Hoy brought his unique style of contemporary ballet combined with Prokofiev’s powerful original score. Guernica is part of the Company’s 2016 Premiere Season Intention and Desire. The body of work was inspired by the messages within Picasso’s famous mural of the same name.   You will not get a cheap version of mainstream productions with the Melbourne Ballet Company. All of the dancers, handpicked by the directors, developed their skills with the likes of the Paris Opera Ballet, Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet New York, West Australian Ballet and the Australian Ballet School. The Company’s newest dancer and leading lady Gemma Pearse was a highlight on opening night. Her portrayal of Juanita, a young Basque woman, delivered on the youthful innocence of the original Juliet. Her character came to life with light effortless jumps and exquisite pointe work in the first act, which was a delight to watch. Pearce along with former Queensland Ballet artist Charles Riddiford as Ramiro, a young Nationalist Officer, formed a convincing partnership as the young lovers with impassioned and beautifully executed pas de deux. Principal dancer Alexander Baden Bryce gave a superb performance in his role of Tybalt with a look fitting for a villain. Principal guest artist and Australian Ballet alumni Adam Thurlow graced the audience performing the role of a clearly frustrated Paris, who was unable to win the attention and love of Juanita.  The small cast brought a strong stage presence, with Hoy’s signature lyrical movements brought to life by the brilliant artistry of the dancers. The simple, colourful costumes were a modern take on the era.    Earlier, I caught up with resident choreographer and director of Guernica Simon Hoy to find out more about his production. In our interview Hoy also discusses how the Melbourne Ballet Company has carved out their own niche as a creative platform that is well on the rise.   Written by Caroline Tung

To anyone who's been holding out for a good theatrical sequel, Roberto Aguire Sacasa's Abigail/1702 is the latest member of that rare species. Picking up 10 years from the ending of its predecessor, Arthur Miller's The Crucible, Sacasa plucks out Miller's two-faced antagonist, Abigail Williams, and turns her into a very successful protagonist. The past decade has transformed the jealous young girl into a desperately puritanical young woman. Once a fierce denouncer in the Salem witch trials who sent 20 people to their deaths over a tumultuous affair with John Proctor, the married man she once worked for, she now lives on a farm in Boston. She has abandoned her now infamous name and adopted the new identity of a god-fearing farmer and nurse, which she hopes will drive away Satan's hold on her. So far she has been successful. After all these years of living in a modest little hut, surrounded by dense forest and countless iron crosses, the Devil has not come to reclaim her. However, the arrival of a handsome wounded sailor, who is ironically named John Brown, is enough to stir up feelings that she has thus far been able to suppress. Their attraction to each other is palpable, as much as Abigail might deny it, but she certainly hasn't forgotten the last time she gave in to a man's insistence on bedding her, and not least because both men share the same first name. Abigail/1702 reveals that John Proctor, the protagonist of The Crucible, forced himself upon Abigal the first time that they slept together, even though their later encounters were apparently consensual. While John Brown never physically violates her, he is not about to take no for answer. He scoffs at her choice of chastity, and declares, to the shock of the audience, that "a woman who is not a wife or a mother is only half a woman." Although, thanks to Abigail, John's wife, Elizabeth Proctor, is now a widow with no surviving children, and looks at most like half a woman when Abigail comes to see her in a desperate attempt to set things right. The Crucible's account of the absurd Salem witch-hunt was famously allegorical, with its real target being the anti-communist paranoia that Senator McCarthy was still stirring up when it was first performed. However, Sacasa's sequel does not continue this focus. Its social commentary is much more visible at the surface, but arguably just as contemporary. While it is remarkable how seamlessly our old spiteful villain has transitioned into a sympathetic tragic heroine, there is no denying that she is still up to her old tricks. She is still doing selfish things for purportedly selfless and pious reasons. Her intentions are good, but they are nowhere near as pure as she tells herself. Her interest in redeeming herself, in healing the sick and in caring for orphans only started when she found out that the Devil was in hot pursuit of her. Swinging between extremes is the only way she knows how to survive. When she is not destroying every life in sight, she is trying to save them all. When she is not entering into abusive love affairs, she is abstaining from all sexual acts. Whatever she tries, it never works for long. Boutique Theatre has added their own special touch to the play's premier Australian production. At the bottom of the staircase leading up to the theatre, each guest is offered a small wheat biscuit. At the top of the stairs, they are offered a thimble cup full of either wine or blackcurrant juice. As they go through the big double doors to take their seats, the usher collects their empty cup and warns them that this 'communion' "may not save your soul." Just like this play's depiction of the Devil, who surprisingly is present as a character here, this elaborate welcome strikes the right balance between campy and caustic. Abigail/1702 feels just as cruel as its predecessor, but it is also much more playful. Abigail's sins might have been forgiven, but they certainly have not been forgotten. There is a sadistic sense of inevitability to Abigail's great punishment, as it would seem that not only circumstance but also her nature have always been against her. Under Elizabeth's excellent direction, the cast of this production do a fine job of creating either complex or more cartoonish characters well called upon, just as the special effects team have a good sense of when to make things stylised and certainly know when and how to make things look realistic. Emma Caldwell is particularly impressive as Abigail and Jessica Tanner leaves an especially strong impression as the wounded Elizabeth. Nick Casey's forest-inspired set design is the perfect landscape for these haunting figures to prowl about in and the thrust theatre staging literally gives every audience member a different perspective on the action. Depending on where they are seated, some character reactions may be obscured while others happen in plain view. There is no level playing field for these characters as they each receive their judgement. Sacasa has also written a fair bit for the screen, which shows here in the way he takes his cues from some of the best cinematic sequels as he crafts this follow-up to Arthur Miller's classic play. He draws on the most interesting story points of The Crucible while still having his own story to tell and his own messages to send. As such, Abigail/1702 is not only a fitting continuation of the original story, but it also works solidly as a standalone piece. Written by Christian Tsoutsouvas